


Millstone

by eleanor_lavish



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Derek Has Issues, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Hooker Fic, Human Derek Hale, M/M, Prostitute Derek
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-28
Updated: 2016-12-29
Packaged: 2017-12-30 17:28:06
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 31,368
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1021412
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eleanor_lavish/pseuds/eleanor_lavish
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>Derek waits until the door is shut behind him before he turns around. He holds out his hand, plants his ‘if you’re not weird about it, I won’t be’ smile on his face and says, “Nice to meet you, Stiles. I’m Michael. What kind of a good time are you looking for tonight?”</i>
</p><p> </p><p>Or, the hooker!Derek fic of my id.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to Allecto, my TW writing buddy who is always supportive even when I yell WHY IS THIS TERRIBLE at her. And immense, undying thanks to Turnpikedarling who was my cheerleading squad, my enabler and my beta all in one. I hope she keeps going, because there is so much more of this to write!
> 
> Title (and a lot of other shit, sorry about that), from Brand New's "Millstone."

The building is a walk-up, three stories of once-gorgeous marble stairs with grooves worn into them from a century of shoes. It’s in Morningside, so it’s probably student housing, or maybe faculty. It’s hard to prejudge the clients he gets in this part of town, which makes Derek’s job harder. Things are easy when the address is a block of pre-wars on York and 70th (young douchebags, usually drunk by the time Derek arrives), or a Chelsea brownstone (older, dominant, hiding a gym body under a Dolce suit). Up here, Derek preps for anything.

He pauses halfway up the last set of stairs to check his reflection in the stairwell windowpane. The service told him that the client had requested ‘casual’, so Derek’s in dark-wash jeans and a black henley, no jewelry to speak of except for a silver thumb ring he stole from Laura, who’d stolen it from their dad way back when. On his dad, the ring had fit around his middle finger, grooves etched into the outside like an old vinyl record. Derek’s hands weren’t as big as his dad’s had been - he’s what the service calls ‘built but compact’, like a fucking sedan. He twists the ring a few times before taking a deep breath. He takes the last few steps a few at a time. There aren’t many doors on each floor; Derek finds the one marked ‘3F’ and knocks. 

There are footsteps in the short hall, and Derek can hear someone on the other side of the door reach for the knob but there’s a pause - a few long seconds where nothing happens at all. Derek smiles to himself. The guy is nervous, and Derek knows that means it’ll be more work upfront, but nerves also give Derek some semblance of control over the situation. That’s not something he always gets. Sure enough -

“Hi, I’m… okay, wow, you’re really hot,” the guy says when he finally opens the door, and Derek smiles wider. The guy is young - definitely in the age range of student and not professor - with deep brown eyes and unruly hair that looks like he spends a lot of time running his hands through it. He’s tapping his long fingers on the open door, a nervous tick that he doesn’t even notice, but he’s smiling through the nerves. He looks like he’s in decent shape underneath the layers of cotton and flannel. He looks… nice, which. Well, those are sometimes the worst, for Derek, but the guy made the call and opened the door, so maybe Derek can push him away from thinking this is a date pretty quickly.

“That’s name’s definitely a mouthful,” he kids, and the guy lets out a bubble of nervous laughter. 

“No, um, my real name actually _is_ a mouthful, so. I just go by Stiles.” Derek is still standing in the doorway, but when he raises his eyebrows in question, the guy - Stiles, and maybe it’s not his real name, but Derek kind of assumes it is because who would make that up? - moves out of the way. “Yeah, come on in,” he says with a flourish of his arm. Derek takes in the tiny one-bedroom, stacks of books on nearly every surface, a few dishes drying next to the sink. “It’s not much, but its home.”

Derek waits until the door is shut behind him before he turns around. He holds out his hand, plants his ‘if you’re not weird about it, I won’t be’ smile on his face and says, “Nice to meet you, Stiles. I’m Michael. What kind of a good time are you looking for tonight?”

*

Some people who end up in New York fall into sex work the old fashioned way - homelessness, drugs, desperately dating nice guys who turn out to be terrible pimps. Derek managed to avoid those traps only because Laura kept him close enough those first few years after the accident that Derek couldn’t skip a _class_ without her finding out about it. She bullied and badgered, yelled and threatened, and he let her because he could hear her some nights, crying on the other side of the thin bedroom wall in their shitty apartment, and he knew it was his fault.

He finished high school, just barely, and got into community college, and hated every fucking second of it. He managed to get a useless Associates degree in liberal arts, and shredded the transfer applications Laura left on the kitchen table. Laura just sighed and told him if he was going to keep living with her, he needed a job.

The problem is, Derek isn’t good at much of anything. He’s a shitty student, bad with words, terrible with people. What he’s okay at is the solitary exercise of keeping in shape, at denying his body ice cream and pizza, at pushing his lats and glutes until they burn. So when he’s approached on the street about modeling he figures it’s as good a fit for his lack-of-skill set as anything. And when his boss tells him he knows some people, knows a way Derek could make serious money if he was interested, Derek figures that it only makes sense. 

He calls the service, he tries it out a few times and… it’s not the worst thing that’s ever happened to him. And the money is good, and only gets better, year after year. He moves out of Laura’s and into a loft in a not-quite-gentrified part of Brooklyn. He buys his own gym equipment. He gets the full cable package from Time Warner. He learns the name of the guy who runs the bodega across the street. It’s fine. It’s a life. It’s Derek’s life.

*

Stiles isn’t some trustafarian kid, some blue-blood Ivy League asshole. He’s not looking to save Derek, to preach about the value of an education, to feel sorry for him. He’s hooked up with a guy in his class, he tells Derek, a Classics major with an ass that won’t quit. “I’m kind of an ass man,” he says, grinning nervously, and Derek smiles back. “I’m not, like, completely unfamiliar with the equipment,” Stiles explains, and Derek fills in _makeouts, frottage, awkward blowjobs_. “But I don’t have a lot of… experience. In that area.”

“That’s why I’m here, I’m guessing,” Derek says, and Stiles shrugs, a little sheepish. Derek’s still trying to pinpoint how this night is going to go. What Stiles is going to want from him, and why he asked the service for someone who wasn’t dominant. Usually that means Derek will end up on his knees pretty quickly, but this kid is green - really green, like, gay-virgin green - and Derek thinks he doesn’t know _what_ he wants, but he wants to be in charge of it. Derek admires that.

“Can we just talk, for a little while?” Stiles says. “I’m actually really shitty at random hookups. Which is probably obvious, or you wouldn’t be here.” Stiles stops, his eyes going wide. “Oh, man, I didn’t meant that as - you’re great, you know? Way better than I could have pulled off on my own.” Derek bites the inside of his lip to keep from laughing as Stiles turns pink. “I’m going to have a beer,” Stiles says, changing tacks abruptly. “You want anything?”

Stiles can _talk_. It’s not a gift Derek has ever had, the ability to switch topics from one to another to another, gauging the interest of his audience to keep them continuously engaged. Stiles is a master at it, though, and he talks about his senior thesis (on the Saxon invasion of England), and comic book movies (Stiles is pro-Nolan, and hates how much he loved the Avengers), and where Derek should stop on his way home for a late-night snack (Mel’s, for the California burger). Stiles is dryly funny, his humor sharp enough to be cutting sometimes, and Derek laughs a few times, genuine laughs that surprise him. He realizes that Stiles is putting Derek at ease as much as himself. 

Derek likes it. He likes _Stiles_. He probably wouldn’t have looked twice at him on the street but here, in the warmth of Stiles’s tiny kitchen, Derek can’t stop watching the way Stiles waves his hands around as he talks, the moles trailing down his neck, the way his mouth fits around the neck of his bottle. For the first time in a long time, Derek wonders what kissing someone new will taste like, feels a shiver of anticipation as Stiles runs his long fingers through his hair. Derek has to look away until the feeling passes.

“What about you?” Stiles asks. “What’s your story?”

Derek shrugs. _Living large, good money, nice perks_ he usually says, because that’s what they all want to hear. That Derek’s living the dream, schlepping to strangers’ apartments late at night, getting fucked by men who never know his real name, spending fifty bucks a pop on 3am cabs back to Brooklyn. With Stiles, the words die in his mouth. “No story,” he says. It’s not true; Derek is a monumental fuck-up, and his story is etched into every cell in his body, unforgettable and nauseating. He catches Stiles watching him, watches as Stiles opens his mouth and then closes it, takes a sip of his beer. “I do think Nolan is overrated, though,” he adds, because he knows it will make Stiles sputter and smile.

Stiles had a girlfriend, one he started dating in high school back in California. They broke up over a year ago. “We had a good run, but it was doomed to failure,” he sighs, leaning against his tiny kitchen table nursing a Heineken. Derek has a glass of water; he doesn’t drink while he’s working. “She was out of my league.”

“How so?” Derek asks before he can think about it. It’s not a good idea to get guys to start talking about exes. Exes are bad for business. But Stiles seems like any small-town California girl’s wet dream, with his quick smile and his long legs. Stiles just shrugs again.

“She’s married to the academic track, and the long-distance thing to Cambridge was a killer. Though we probably dragged the whole thing out longer than it should have lasted. She dumped me, I was a mess for a year, I slept with a few girls who weren’t her, and woke up my senior year finally over her, thank god.”

Derek just nods, slouches back a little against the wall, wonders if Stiles is just going to talk at him all night, if he’s paying premium to just have someone listen and not be a douche about it. Derek’s had those before, too. He wonders why they don’t just go into therapy, but then he remembers how much he hated his Laura-appointed therapy and figures he’s just as useful as a shrink.

“Anyway, that brings us to Ben, the hottest piece of ass I had ever seen until you knocked on my door, and the reason you are here,” Stiles drains his beer with a flourish and stands up to drop it in the recycling bin.

“Ben, huh?” Derek asks, placing his glass gently in the sink. “He cute?”

“Definitely cute,” Stiles says. His hands are curled around the edge of the kitchen counter now, nerves creeping back into his posture. “Definitely not anything like you, but that’s okay. I just need… practice. I need to not do this wrong.”

“You don’t think he’d like to let you practice with him?” Derek asks, and winces inwardly. He keeps straying from the playbook, but Stiles is getting under his skin for some reason. Maybe it’s the box of Ramen noodle packets tucked under the table. Maybe it’s the worn Wonder Woman logo on Stiles’s t-shirt, or the way he’s talking to Derek like he’s a real person, but not a date. It’s unsettling.

“Yeah, I’d rather not.” Stiles looks down at his blue Vans, kicks his heel against the floor a few times. “He’s definitely not the kind of guy who would appreciate incompetence.”

 _I don’t want him to laugh at me,_ Derek hears, and Derek thinks this Ben guy is probably not worth Stiles’s time. Who wouldn’t like Stiles, with his long lashes and his self-deprecating grin? Derek shakes himself - he has to get back on track here, get Stiles into the spirit of things, get fucked, go home. Just a normal night, just another client.

“Well,” he says, pushing off from the wall and taking a few slow steps until he’s inches from Stiles, eye-to-eye, “I am definitely up for some practice.”

“You’re literally a pro, dude,” Stiles cracks a nervous smile. “I doubt you need the practice. I just need to not embarrass myself.”

Derek reaches out and skims his fingers under Stiles’s flannel shirt, ghosts his knuckles over the t-shirt underneath. “What do you want to do, Stiles? What do you want to do to me?” he murmurs, watching Stiles’s lips part in a silent exhale, and this is better. This is where Derek belongs.

Stiles is holding himself more still than Derek has seen him all night. “I want… _fuck_.” Derek leans into him, his stubble catching on Stiles’s cheek for a second, his teeth scraping gently against Stiles’s earlobe. “Michael,” Stiles gasps, and it’s jarring in a way that Derek hasn’t felt in _years_ , hearing his professional name coming from Stiles’s mouth. Derek pulls away from him for a second, and he feels his neck flush. _Don’t give this kid your real name,_ he has to remind himself. That’s Escort 101 - give them the fantasy, not yourself.

“Yeah,” he manages, flattening his hand against Stiles’s stomach, over his shirt. Stiles blinks at him for a moment, his eyes flitting over Derek’s face in a way that makes him strangely uncomfortable, like Stiles is studying him. He needs to turn the tables, and fast. “You wanna fuck me, Stiles?” he asks, smiling slowly, and Stiles’s eyes go impossibly dark.

“Shit, yeah, yes,” Stiles says, leaning in and then jerking back. “God, sorry, can I - I want to kiss you. Can I kiss you?” he asks, mouth red and panting inches from Derek’s. 

“This isn’t Pretty Woman, Stiles,” Derek says dryly before he leans in and captures his lips, not lingering on the soft and sweet kiss that Stiles presses there, but opening his mouth and using his tongue, making Stiles roll his body closer. 

Derek slides his hand around Stiles’s back, rucking up his t-shirt and palming Stiles’s smooth skin. He tilts his head, lets Stiles lead the kiss for a moment. Stiles tastes like the beer he just finished, warm and sweet underneath, and he certainly isn’t a slouch when it comes to technique. Whoever this ex-girlfriend is, she taught him a thing or two, enough that Derek actually gasps when Stiles tucks his hand at the nape of Derek’s neck and flicks his tongue against Derek’s. 

Derek flushes again - something about this kid keeps surprising him, and Derek can’t let that happen, can’t deal with the potential fallout from that. He pushes forward, presses his thigh against Stiles’s groin a little too fast, a little too hard. Stiles reaches out to clutch at Derek’s shirt. He breaks the kiss with a stuttered, “Oh, fuck,” and _there_ it is, the control Derek lost for a moment. Derek can feel the sharp edge to the smile on his face.

“You want to move this somewhere more comfortable?” Derek asks.

“That’s, um,” Stiles says, and Derek’s gaze is drawn to his mouth. He reaches up, runs his thumb over the swell of Stiles’s lower lip, and Stiles goes still again. He blinks at Derek, his eyes a little unfocused, and Derek can feel every breath he takes. “God, yeah, okay,” Stiles says, and Derek takes a step back, enough that Stiles can get his bearings. “Bedroom?” Stiles asks, his eyes darting to the open door a few steps away.

“I mean, I can work with this,” Derek says, “but unless you’re planning on fucking Ben over your kitchen counter -”

“Hey, bedroom! That is definitely the better plan!” Stiles says, grinning. He tangles their fingers together as he pulls Derek across the tiny hallway. Derek tries not be charmed, but he catches sight of himself in the mirror on the back of Stiles’s closet door and he’s surprised to find his smile looks real.

Standing at the foot of his bed (made up - Derek always wonders why these guys _make the bed_ for him) Stiles toes out of his shoes and looks back at Derek. Derek hasn’t fucked a nervous virgin in _years_ , especially not one who specifically requested that Derek not be in control. Now that he’s got them to the bedroom, he waits, wondering where Stiles will take this next. He doesn’t wait long. 

“C’mere,” Stiles tugs on his hand and Derek steps right into his personal space, their chests brushing. “This is kind of crazy,” he says, nervous laughter bubbling out of him. “I didn’t even know if I would go through with it, but now you’re here, and you’re all” - Stiles waves his free hand around, and Derek bites back a grin - “and I’m just. Crazy. Is all I’m saying.”

“I make you crazy, Stiles?” Derek asks, his grin finally breaking through.

Stiles huffs. “I would like to meet any dude-inclined person who you would _not_ drive crazy. But no, I mean. I thought this was a terrible idea, but maybe it’s not?”

“If you thought it was a terrible idea, why did you call?” Derek asks, and _fuck_ , his filter is just blown with this guy.

Stiles grins back at him. “I am the _king_ of bad ideas,” he says, and Derek leans in to kiss his jaw. 

“If you want, I can help you come up with a few new ones,” he says, and smiles wider when it makes Stiles laugh. 

“Fuck, I am sure that’s true. But,” he says, sliding his hands around Derek’s waist and up his back in a slow, smooth glide, “I think I should stick with the original bad idea, at least for tonight.” He slips his hands back down and under the waist of Derek’s shirt, stopping before his hands hit skin. “Can I?” he asks again. 

Usually Derek gets told what he wants, not asked. It’s something that puts him on edge some nights, something he’s bitched about to other guys he knows in the business. Stiles expects Derek to be a willing participant in anything, even something as obvious as taking off his clothes. It should feel good, to be asked. Instead, Derek just feels this burning frustration. “Whatever you want,” he says, and Stiles pauses. 

“Yeah, but. Just… you’ll tell me if you don’t want me to do something, right?” 

“It’s a shirt, Stiles. You can take it off. I figured that was part of the deal.” Derek tries not to sound pissed. It’s sweet, that the kid thinks that Derek gets a say in this. It’s not a fucking date, and Stiles keeps… or, no. _Derek_ keeps forgetting. Stiles is just a guy who’s never fucked anyone he didn’t actually know before. _Stiles isn’t the problem here,_ Derek chides himself.

“Yeah, but -” Stiles starts, and Derek just sighs and pulls his shirt over his head just to shut Stiles up and speed things along. It doesn’t have the desired effect on either. “Holy… you’re just. That’s… a lot of abs,” Stiles chokes out, and he’s still _not touching Derek_. “Do you, like, live at the gym? Is that terrible? I fucking hate the gym, which is why I did track in high school - running is a great solitary -” he stops abruptly when Derek raises an eyebrow. “Aaand I’m babbling. So, that’s great.”

“Stiles,” Derek says as gently as he can manage. “Just… shut up and kiss me again.” Stiles barks out a laugh and suddenly the nervous tension is gone from his shoulders.

“Okay,” he says, pulling Derek closer and sliding his hands around Derek’s bare waist. “Okay.”

Derek doesn’t usually love kissing clients; it’s an act that doesn’t give Derek the distance that he needs to make this job work for him. Getting fucked is almost easier, with Derek on his stomach, his face turned into a pillow, whoever is above him chanting someone else’s name. Kissing Stiles isn’t any different - there’s definitely not enough distance, hasn’t been since Stiles kicked his Vans against the kitchen counter and grinned at Derek, his eyes crinkling in the corners. But Derek lets it go on for way too long, lets Stiles explore his skin with strong hands, lets him lead until they’re both dizzy from it, coming up for air in a haze. “Man, you’re really good at that,” Stiles says, panting a little. Derek tries to refocus, but all he can think is that Stiles’s hands are big and warm on his back, and it just feels _nice_.

“You too,” he murmurs and he can feel Stiles smile as Derek leans in to kiss his jaw, then down his neck, sliding his hands under Stiles’s shirt and palming smooth skin. “Off,” he practically growls into Stiles’s throat; Stiles shivers, and Derek has to pull back before he pushes too hard, too far. Before Stiles remembers this version of Derek is not the one he asked for. But the second there’s any space between them, Stiles strips off his flannel shirt and pulls his t-shirt over his head in one slightly-spastic movement. 

“Better?” he asks Derek, and Derek just hums and pulls Stiles closer. They kiss some more, and Derek can feel that Stiles is getting hard, his hips rolling into Derek’s faster and harder. That’s not a surprise - half the guys Derek fucks are hard when he knocks on their doors. The surprise is that Derek’s dick is into the action too. When Stiles slides a hand over his ass and pulls him closer, Derek actually moans from the friction. 

That’s definitely not normal.

And as much as Derek kind of _likes_ it, it’s also really, really not okay.

 _Speed it up,_ he tells himself, _get it over with._ Derek tugs open Stiles’s jeans and pushes them past his hips without much more than a whimper from Stiles. He slides his palm over the obvious bulge in Stiles’s underwear and steps back, peeling his own jeans off and stepping out of them. Stiles reaches for him, pulls him closer, and it doesn’t take much for Derek to keep the momentum going, lowering them both to the bed.

Derek pushes some more, folding himself over Stiles, mouthing at his neck. Stiles has acres of smooth, pale skin, all of it warm and blush-pink as Derek’s hands slide up his bare sides. He arches up as Derek’s hips press down and for a moment it’s frantic, Stiles’s breath hitching on a curse as his dick presses against Derek’s groin. “Wait, wait,” Stiles pants, his voice slipping into a lower register that zings off Derek’s spine. “Just, wait, here,” he says, and folds their fingers together as they roll against each other, slower but with more intent. When Derek looks down, Stiles is staring up at him with dark eyes, his mouth open a fraction. “I just - we should go slow, okay?” Stiles says, and presses an open mouthed kiss to Derek’s shoulder.

“Yeah,” Derek breathes, because he’s supposed to agree, and because the ache of _want_ is back in his stomach, tingling as Stiles wraps one lean thigh around his waist. Stiles kisses him again and Derek gets lost in it, in the slick heat of Stiles’s mouth, the slide of skin-on-skin, the jolt from his dick every time Stiles rises to meet him. Derek almost doesn’t register the hard press of  
Stiles’s hand on his shoulder, pushing him away.

“Shit, stop,” Stiles grits out, “I’m too close,” and Derek goes still, pressing his face into Stiles’s skin and breathing hard through his nose. He’s close too, and they both still have their goddamned underwear on. Stiles takes a few long breaths before relaxing back into the mattress. His fingers slide into Derek’s hair. “I mean. This is pretty spectacular, but if we keep going, I am definitely not going to reach the finish line without embarrassing myself.”

Derek hides his smile in Stiles’s shoulder. “Wouldn’t want that.”

“You should just,” Stiles starts, but he’s already shifting, rolling them. Derek takes the hint and flops over on his back, stretching out on the bed and raising his arms over his head. It’s a show, a good one, and Stiles is a very appreciative audience. “Okay, that’s. Good,” he manages, his voice a little strangled.

“Maybe you could give me a hand with these?” Derek asks, lifting his hips a fraction. Stiles slides one hand up Derek’s thigh and over his cotton-clad dick, exploring. There’s a damp patch of material, darker than the rest, and Stiles presses his thumb there. Derek’s hips jerk, and he turns his face into his arm to keep from making a sound. He’s glad he does, because the sound _Stiles_ makes is pretty fantastic. 

“God, you’re so -” Stiles starts, but he trails off in favor of leaning down and nuzzling Derek’s dick, his breath hot and damp through the fabric.

“Fuck,” Derek gasps, his hand wrapping around the back of Stiles’s neck before he can stop himself, pushing up as Stiles presses down. Stiles groans deep in his throat, opens his mouth wider. His hands rub over Derek’s hips a few times as his tongue darts out, and it feels both amazing and like a gigantic tease. Stiles isn’t a tease though; his fingers curl in the waist of Derek’s briefs and pull them down, peeling them over Derek’s hard dick, precome smearing across the head as Stiles leans in to slide spit-slick lips from the base to the tip. It’s hot and wet and _shocking_ , enough to get Derek to tighten his grasp on Stiles’s neck and pull him back. “N-no,” he manages, and Stiles freezes in place, eyes wide.

“Sorry, _shit_ , sorry,” he says, a deep blush rushing to his cheeks, and Derek can’t look at him.

“No, just,” Derek says, motioning with one arm to where his jeans lay in a crumpled heap on the floor. “I brought condoms,” he says and Stiles leans back a bit more, onto his knees, and bites his lip.

“Already?” he asks. “I mean, not that I’m not looking forward to it, but I was just getting comfortable with the blowjob portion of the evening.” He smiles, flirty and cheeky, and Derek still can’t look him in the eye.

“No, for - it’s safer. If you want to blow me, that’s cool, but. I tested clean last time, but it’s safer with a condom.”

Condoms for blowjobs are a good idea, but not a rule for Derek if they want to blow him - not like condoms for fucking. They don’t all listen to him, and Derek doesn’t honestly care. It’s his responsibility, he thinks, to make sure the men he fucks at least get a reminder. He thinks he’s probably had sex with five or six people since that last test, and he was safe, every time, but. But.

If Stiles pushes the issue, Derek thinks he’ll lie and make it a rule.

Stiles blinks at him, and Derek tries not to imagine the scenes that must be running through his head - how many people Derek has fucked, the stark reminder that Derek isn’t some co-ed he picked up at a party. “Yeah, of course,” Stiles says finally, shaking himself a little and shuffling to the edge of the bed to grab for Derek’s jeans. “I have condoms too,” he prattles on, stuffing his long fingers into the front pocket until he finds a handful of condoms and a travel-sized bottle of lube, “but yeah, I mean, you probably have your favorites. Hey, these are the ones I have, only not lubed!” Derek shucks his underwear off completely while Stiles fumbles back up the bed and carefully rips open the wrapper, babbling in a way that shouldn’t be adorable but is. “Lube plus blowjobs is probably gross, unless - I mean, I haven’t tried the flavored ones, so maybe not. Oh hey,” Stiles pauses. “You have a tattoo.”

“Yup,” Derek says, reaching for Stiles’s wrist and tugging to get him back on task. He’s immensely relieved that the condom thing doesn’t seem to be an issue for Stiles, and now that they’re back on track, Derek’s dick would like back in on the action.

“Patience, grasshopper,” Stiles tells him, batting Derek’s hand away. Derek snorts. Stiles runs a finger along the whorls of the words that wrap around his hip, the text almost unreadable through the ornate font. “What does it say?”

“It says ‘stop punking out, Stiles,’” Derek goads him, grinning sharply. Stiles rolls his eyes. 

“Fine, whatever, I won’t read your girly tattoo.”

“You’re the one who didn’t want to skip the blowjob portion of the evening,” Derek reminds him, one eyebrow arching, and Stiles sighs dramatically before sliding one hand up to cup Derek’s balls. Derek hisses.

“I think you’ll find that _you_ are the one who doesn’t want me to skip this portion of the evening,” he replies and rolls the condom down Derek’s shaft with practiced ease, “I definitely know what I’m doing in this area.” He leans in and picks up right where he left off, his lips running up Derek’s dick but not stopping this time before suckling the head and sucking him halfway down.

Stiles isn’t wrong; Derek’s glad for the tiny distance the condom gives him from the sensation of Stiles’s mouth, because he’s genuinely fucking _great_ at this. Great enough that Derek’s head rolls back on the pillow with a groan, that his right leg flails out as Stiles flicks his tongue. Great enough that Derek doesn’t even register that Stiles’s hands have moved until he hears the *snick* of the lube bottle opening. 

“Stiles,” he manages, his fingers finding Stiles’s hair and tugging a fraction. They haven’t talked about this, about how Stiles wants to do this. About how much Stiles knows about the mechanics. But Stiles pulls off Derek’s dick just long enough to get a few fingers slicked up, nudging Derek’s knee up and over his shoulder. 

“Like this, right?” he says, his mouth already red and swollen, and he uses his other hand to get Derek’s dick back in his mouth before Derek can even answer. He sucks hard, just enough to make Derek groan, and gently pushes one finger into Derek’s ass. Derek’s fingers spasm and he pulls them quickly out of Stiles’s hair, clutching at the bedspread instead. Derek takes it, this agonizing push-pull of Stiles’s mouth and his hand, expecting Stiles to get tired pretty quickly. Derek’s done this, knows it’s more boring than hot, opening someone up like this, slow and methodically. 

But Stiles doesn’t stop. Not at two fingers, not even when he has three inside Derek, twisting until he’s shaking from it, both of them sweating. Stiles keeps looking up at him, grinning when he pulls off Derek’s dick just long enough to suck on his balls before diving back in for more. 

He’s trying to make it _good_ for Derek, and Derek will let him, because that’s Stiles’s fantasy, that’s why Derek is here. As practice for Stiles to do this with someone else. Someone worthy of this kind of slow, precise adoration.

Derek hates him just a little. 

“Oh my god, Stiles, just,” he finally grits out, his hips shifting on the bed so that Stiles’s fingers are angled just so, the flat plane of them rubbing his prostate. He’s close to coming, and maybe that’s Stiles’s play - get Derek to come first so that he’s pliant, easy when Stiles fucks into him. Derek doesn’t hate this plan.

But when he digs his fingers into Stiles’s shoulder and grits out a warning that he’s close, Stiles just groans and pulls his mouth away, sits back and eases his fingers out of Derek’s ass. Derek almost kicks him.

“Dude,” Derek snaps, and he has never called a client _dude_ before in his life, but he was seconds from shaking out of his skin. 

“ _Dude_ ,” Stiles grins at him, his mouth almost offensively red. Derek rubs his hands over his face a few times in frustration. Stiles leans over to grab another condom; Derek’s a little surprised that he’s still hard. Stiles definitely enjoyed that. “Sorry, was that… I mean, if you want me to keep going I can do that, I just thought this way would be more fun.” He pauses. “I can though, if you want to come? I would be more than happy to -”

“For fuck’s sake, Stiles,” Derek groans, but he’s laughing a little too. They haven’t talked about this yet. It’s almost clinical for Derek these days - ‘how do you want me?’, ‘hair pulling - yes or no?’ - but this has been so easy, the glide from the kitchen to here, both of them naked and a little slick from sweat. Derek doesn’t want to ask his usual questions. He lifts one knee, bumping it into Stiles’s side. “What do _you_ want?” 

Stiles leans over, props himself on two hands over Derek. “I want to keep looking at you,” he says, and Derek rolls his eyes, but he also reaches up to run his hands over Stiles’s sides, feels the shift of muscle under skin. 

“Is that all you want?” Derek answers, leaning up a fraction to nip at Stiles’s jaw.

Stiles moans. “Nope. Was hoping for a lesson, here, Mr. Professional.”

“You seem to have the basics down just fine.”

“I did some research,” Stiles mumbles.

Derek grins. “Porn is not research, Stiles.”

“Oh? I didn’t hear you complaining a minute ago -” he starts, and Derek cuts him off with a light slap on his ass. Stiles bites his lip, his head dropping forward. Derek thinks about flipping them, about going down on Stiles with no latex in the way, about making Stiles say his name - his _real_ name. He remembers how it felt when Stiles folded their fingers together, how it felt _right_ and not like an act. Derek is terrified by how much he’s not acting. 

Stiles is definitely a little nervous, but it’s still so fucking _easy_ , and Derek wonders if it’s because he doesn’t need Derek to like him back. If it’s better because to Stiles Derek is just live-action porn with no strings and no feelings. Stiles kisses the side of Derek’s throat with just a hint of tongue, and Derek can’t help the tremor that rolls through him. 

“Focus,” Derek rumbles - to himself as much as Stiles - and Stiles surges in to kiss him. Derek only has a second to savor it, to cup Stiles’s head in his hands and taste him, the faint echo of latex on his tongue, before Stiles is leaning back on his heels, ripping open the condom wrapper with a lot less finesse the second time around. 

“You want focus?” He asks, his eyes glinting. Derek’s stomach clenches. Stiles uses a lot of lube - enough to probably ruin his bedspread - and slides two slick fingers back into Derek with almost no resistance at all. “I can focus, man. Usually it takes a few Adderall to make it work, but apparently impatient brunettes work just as well.”

Derek grunts, his eyes slipping closed. “Hey,” Stiles nudges him. “Pillow.”

Derek grabs a pillow at random from the few under his head and hands it down to Stiles. It’s shoved unceremoniously under Derek’s hips. Stiles grins at him. “You ready for this?” he asks, one hand slowly slicking himself up. 

Derek knows he’s supposed to beg for it, to give him a ‘give it to me, stud’ line from a cheesy porn, but he’s giddy and off-balance, and what comes out is, “I think I can take it, Stiles. Come on, show me what you learned from hours of xtube research.”

Stiles narrows his eyes, and Derek loves the tension in his shoulders, the way he shakes his head at Derek, the slow tease of Stiles’s dick pressed against his hole, slick and so hot. “Say please,” Stiles grins at him, and Derek doesn’t know whether to punch him or kiss him.

He grins back, sharp and predatory. “Pretty please, with a cherry on -” Derek bites off a curse as Stiles presses into him slow and hard and deep. Derek is so ready for it - more than he has been in… years, probably - and when Stiles fucks into him, he doesn’t feel the burn at all, just shivers of pleasure as Stiles bottoms out.

“Oh, fucking fuck,” Stiles manages, his eyes squeezed shut and his breathing already ragged. 

“C’mere.” Derek tugs at his arm until Stiles folds over him like before, hitches his hips up until Stiles’s dick slides against his prostate. Derek sucks in a harsh breath.

“There?” Stiles pants, and Derek tightens one leg around his waist in response. Stiles grins down at him and rolls his hips, again and again and again. 

Derek doesn’t usually come while he’s being fucked, not unless someone is really working him over at the same time, but Stiles hasn’t been at it for more than a few minutes and Derek is right there on the edge. “Stiles,” he keens, fingers digging into his back, pulling him even closer. 

“God, this is so, I can’t,” Stiles babbles, a bead a sweat rolling down his temple. Derek rolls his hips up to meet him and Stiles groans deep in his chest, leans in until they’re kissing again, sloppy and desperate. Derek might be able to survive the kissing, the feeling of Stiles inside him, but the friction of his dick against the coarse hair on Stiles’s groin, over and over as Stiles fucks into him faster, is enough to push Derek over the edge. He comes with a shout and a shudder, his nails leaving half-moon indents on Stiles’s biceps.

“Holy… wow,” Stiles says, his eyes wild, “I didn’t even,” but Derek kisses him through the aftershocks. His body is warm and buzzing, and he hitches his hips again. 

“C’mon, Stiles,” he says and he sounds drunk in his own ears, he _feels_ drunk, heavy and loose. His fingers curl around Stiles’s wrists where they shake, holding him over Derek. “Show me what you’ve got,” he says, grinning and giddy. 

Stiles curses, his hips jerking once before he gets his knees under him again. “You can’t just -” he starts, but Derek laughs at him, even when Stiles cups a hand around his neck and pulls him up roughly to kiss him. He keeps fucking Derek for another long minute before he’s shaking and coming and man, Derek doesn’t usually like anyone coming inside him, condom or no, but he’s so fucking high from this, he just holds on and pushes Stiles’s sweat-soaked hair off his forehead, slides kiss-raw lips along his throat as he shakes apart.

After, they cling to each other for a few long moments, Stiles’s nose smushed into Derek’s cheek as he tries to breathe normally again. “Oh my _god_ ,” Stiles finally says, and Derek’s definitely not going to be able to get more eloquent than that.

“Mmm,” he agrees, and Stiles starts to giggle enough that Derek can feel it everywhere. Even his ass, where Stiles is still buried inside him. Derek winces a little.

“Oh, fuck, sorry,” Stiles says, pulling away. “How do I -” he sounds dazed, helpless, and Derek wants to kiss him again. 

Instead, he just says, “You want to hold on to the condom.” Stiles does, his hand still shaking a little. “And go slow,” Derek tells him, exhaling through his nose as Stiles pulls out of him and flops over onto his back next to Derek. 

This is usually the part where Derek feels relieved. Right now, he just feels… empty. Empty and cold. Whatever surge of adrenaline spiked through him when they were fucking is wearing off fast enough that Derek’s shaking a little. Derek blinks at the ceiling - any minute now Stiles is going to come back to himself enough to remember that Derek is a stranger in his bed, and Derek will have to get up and find all his clothes and try to leave this apartment with some shred of dignity left, without begging Stiles to let him stay. 

“Hey,” Stiles’s voice is rough and soft at the same time. They only place they’re touching anymore is where Stiles’s fingers brush against Derek’s hip, near his tattoo. “You want the first shower?”

They’re filthy. They’re both covered in a sheen of lube and sweat and Derek’s come, and Derek doesn’t usually care, he usually wants to get out fast and go home and clean off in his own shower. But he finds himself agreeing, and Stiles is pointing him toward the tiny bathroom across the hall. Derek’s legs don’t shake as he gets up and walks away, but it’s a close thing. He can feel Stiles’s eyes on his back as he closes the door.

He runs the shower hot, and uses Stiles’s shampoo, and feels like maybe he’s going a little crazy.

Stiles orders pizza while Derek is in the shower. It arrives as he’s drying off in the bathroom, and by the time Derek opens the door, a threadbare towel slung around his hips, Stiles is in his boxers and an unzipped hoodie, sitting at the kitchen table, his leg bouncing up and down with nerves. He’s not looking at Derek. “I would have sprung for Thai, but Dominos is the only place that delivers this late,” he says.

“You don’t need to feed me, Stiles,” Derek tells him, walking into the bedroom. Stiles has picked up all his clothes and laid them on the chair in the corner. There’s cash too, a lot more than Derek usually charges. Derek closes his eyes and breathes deeply, his whole body running hot; he hasn’t felt this in _years_ , this _shame_ about what he does, but right now he feels it like a punch to his gut. Derek hates when they do this, and he thought maybe Stiles wouldn’t do it this way, would treat him like this was a normal transaction, hand him his money and look him in the eyes as he did it. 

But this isn’t normal. Derek isn’t normal and his job isn’t normal, and whatever the fuck happened between Stiles and Derek tonight is so far past normal Derek doesn’t even have the capacity to deal with it right now. He pulls his clothes on and shoves his usual rate into his pocket. He leaves the rest on the chair.

Stiles is singing softly to himself when Derek gets back to the kitchen, his fingers tapping out a rhythm on the table. Derek is going to just tell him goodbye, just get the fuck out of there, but - “What are you singing?” he asks abruptly, even though he knows the answer. He knows it like it’s etched into his fucked up heart forever, into his soul, into his skin.

“Nothing,” Stiles startles. He blinks at Derek, and Derek wonders what he must look like right now. “It’s just a song from my favorite album. Your tattoo reminded me -”

“‘Devil and God’ is your favorite album?” Derek says before his brain can find any sort of filter. 

“Yeah, what -” Stiles asks, but he’s grinning. “Holy shit, that’s totally what it’s from, isn’t it? Your tattoo - it’s from ‘Archers.’”

Derek feels like he’s frozen. It’s stupid - Stiles doesn’t _know_ him, doesn’t know how he spent the months after his parents died looking for anything that would make him feel okay, how this stupid album from this stupid band made him feel like he maybe it was _okay_ to not feel okay, made him feel _something_ , even if that something was seething, roiling anger. Doesn’t know that Derek stole a hundred dollars from Laura to get the tattoo done when he was barely eighteen, the words a jumbled maze of ornate letters asking him _What did you learn tonight?_ , so he never forgets that his actions have consequences.

Stiles doesn’t know any of that. Stiles is just standing there, still smelling like sex and sweat and _Derek_ , grinning like he knows a secret. “So,” he asks, “what _did_ you learn tonight, Mr. Girly Song Lyrics Tattoo Guy?”

Derek’s heart is beating a thousand miles a minute. “What did _you_ learn?” he bites back, because he’s pretty sure he learned _something_ tonight, but he’s in no shape to unpack what it is. He doesn’t want to. He wants - 

“A lot, actually,” Stiles says back, a blush blooming high on his cheeks. “I mean, was it okay? It was more than okay on my end. Like, really excellent. _Beyond_ excellent. But I don’t -”

“You’ll do fine,” Derek tells him because he doesn’t know how to say tonight was so far past okay it had come back around to terrible. 

“Do fine with - right,” Stiles blinks back at him, blushing harder. “Ben, yeah, that’s. Of course.” Derek wants to hit something, hard, and he should probably go home and use his punching bag and not the wall of Stiles’s kitchen. He shoves his fists in his pockets.

“I should go,” he nods at the front door. When Stiles doesn’t say anything, he grits his teeth and shrugs and heads into the hallway.

“Wait,” Stiles grabs his arm as he’s pulling the door open. “You don’t want any pizza?”

“Stiles -” Derek sighs.

“For the road, maybe - I could wrap it up -”

“Stiles, you don’t have to -”

“Your name’s not really Michael, is it,” Stiles says and Derek takes a deep steadying breath. Stiles is looking at him with this open, pleading expression. “Just tell me -”

Derek doesn’t let him finish, just leans in and kisses him. One last time - he doesn’t deserve it but he takes it anyway. It surprises a soft ‘Oh!’ out of Stiles and Derek cups his cheek in one hand, feels the rasp of stubble under his fingers, memorizes the way Stiles leans into him, the way they fit together so easily. Then he pulls away, sliding his thumb over Stiles’s cheek. “Goodbye, Stiles,” he says. 

He smiles, and he means it, and he walks away.

*

He isn’t going to see Stiles again. Stiles was a one-time kind of client, and Derek is good with that. Better than good. Thinking about Stiles makes Derek feel things he hasn’t felt in years - happy and horny and desperate to see him - and it totally sucks.

Stiles maybe has a boyfriend now, and Derek tries really hard not to be insanely jealous of some kid he doesn’t know, but sometimes, after a long night, or even on his nights off, when he allows himself some perfunctory masturbatory fantasies, Stiles creeps into his consciousness, hovers on the edge, saying things like “hey, hey, slow down,” or “I’ve got you.” Even when Derek is out with other clients, it’s… not good, the things he thinks about Stiles. About how Stiles would give him a minute to breathe before kicking him out, about how Stiles didn’t sneer about using a condom for blowjobs, about how maybe he could ask for just a little more time, a little more prep and then it wouldn’t be… but he doesn’t ask, because that’s not in his fucking job description. 

He’s not going to see Stiles again, which makes it okay, maybe, that he thinks about Stiles too much.

But then, two months later, he gets a message that he’s got a customer asking for him specifically. 

_He says his name is Stiles,_ the text reads. Derek is walking to the subway from an afternoon quickie, and he has to stop and lean on the wall of a bus stop, his fingers shaking. _I know you’re not usually into topping, but he said he wanted you to fuck him. Could prob talk him into someone else, if you’re not interested._

Derek clutches his phone tightly, his ass still sore from being ridden hard by a man who calls him ‘boy’ and pulls his hair until his eyes sting; he tries to imagine Stiles with anyone else, some stranger bending him in half and teasing him open, not being slow enough, not getting his jokes, not… 

He texts back _I’ll do it, set it up_ , and goes home to shower and shower and shower until his skin is pink and new and still not clean enough for this. For Stiles.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh, god. I am mortified to be posting this TEN MONTHS LATE, but here we are. Part 3 is, I promise, in process. No excuses, just more porn, which I hope you will take as an offering. Thanks again, and always, to my beta Turnpikedarling, and my writing buddy Allecto.

Derek climbs the stairs to Stiles’s apartment filled with a crazy mixture of excitement and dread and deja vu. He pauses on the stairs again, looks at his reflection in the window. He feels like this should be different, like he should _look_ different, but it’s his same boring face staring back at him - blue eyes, square jaw, straight teeth that took four years of braces to get just right. Carefully groomed stubble, not too much. Stiles said “casual” again, but when Derek poked through his closet that afternoon picking out something to wear, he ended up in black slacks and a silver button-down with his fleece-lined leather jacket to keep out the winter chill - probably too much, but this was _special_ somehow, and Derek wanted to look good. Wanted to look _worthy_. 

He sees himself now and flushes with embarrassment. It’s not _special_ , christ. And it’s not like he’ll be wearing it for long anyway. Derek climbs the rest of the steps like a man on his way to an execution, all the nervous butterflies dropping like stones in his stomach. He reaches 3F and raises his hand to knock, but the door swings open before he can. 

“Hi, hey,” Stiles says, his cheeks pink, and when Derek’s gaze flicks down, he sees that Stiles is in dark wash jeans and a blue polo shirt that looks soft to the touch, a little tight around his biceps. Based on the clothes Derek saw last time tossed in the corner of Stiles’s bedroom, Stiles is also overdressed for a normal Thursday night. Derek’s stomach unclenches a fraction. 

“Hi,” Derek manages, smiling a little like he can’t help it. Stiles looks good, looks just like Derek remembers, all long fingers and messy hair and dark freckles dotting his neck. Derek forces his eyes up from said neck as Stiles leans back against the open door just enough to let Derek inside. 

“I wasn’t sure you’d, um,” Stiles starts, then laughs nervously. “I mean, I’m sure you have, like, repeat customers. Obviously. I’m just… glad you’re here?” he finishes. Derek pauses for a moment to try and figure out an appropriate response beyond ‘Me too’ or ‘You’re welcome?’ and Stiles rubs his hands through his hair. “Or, wow. Okay, just. I’m going to stop talking.” Stiles’s blush deepens.

“No,” Derek says quickly because if _Stiles_ can’t think of anything to say they’re in for a long, awkward night. “You’re fine. It’s… good to see you.” It’s a vast understatement, but Derek smiles because he means it. He’s been alternately dreading and anticipating this moment for a week, and now that it’s here, he’s stupidly happy to see Stiles, live and in person. “Nice shirt, by the way. Very ‘I’m on the Debate Team’,” he adds, because never let it be said that Derek Hale doesn’t know how to put his foot in his mouth.

Stiles laughs again, some of the tension easing out of his shoulders. “You too, with the knockoff Versace,” he says wryly. “If I didn’t know better, I’d think you were trying to impress me.”

“I’m always impressive,” Derek shoots back, fighting his own blush since Stiles is so, so right. 

Stiles bites his lip as he grins, and Derek grins back. It’s not _easy_ , not even close, but Derek feels a sense of rightness start to settle over him, feels some of the layers of artifice that he wears like a shield whenever he’s with a client breaking down in the warmth of Stiles’s small hallway. It’s wrong, Derek _knows_ this, but he’s here now, and he’s not leaving, so. 

“Did you want something to eat?” Stiles opens the fridge and Derek can see a few layers of takeout containers piled up on each other. “I have… I have no idea, but probably something edible? Or I could order something?”

Stiles’s sink has a few coffee mugs stacked in it, but nothing else. “Did you have dinner?” Derek asks and Stiles shrugs.

“No?” he says sheepishly and Derek sighs. “Right, that’s - is that a bad thing? Do I need to, like, carb load for this?”

“Carb load...”

“Of course I do,” Stiles continues right over Derek. “I mean, last time I slept for ten hours afterwards. You, my friend, are worse than that trainer I had for about three weeks when I thought that was a good idea.”

“Stiles,” Derek says, smiling despite himself, “you probably should eat.”

Stiles stares into his open fridge for another minute. “Thai delivery it is!” he finally nods, closing the fridge and striding to the end of the hallway. Derek follows him into a tiny living room, big enough for a love seat, coffee table and a small flatscreen on a makeshift entertainment center. The only other furniture in the room is a bookshelf that takes up one whole wall, crammed with everything from binders to textbooks to graphic novels. Stiles plops on the loveseat and pulls up Seamless on his laptop. “Requests?” he says, peering up at Derek through his long lashes. 

“You don’t have to get me dinner, Stiles.”

“Did _you_ eat dinner, Mr. Rogers?” 

Derek hasn’t eaten much all day, too nervous to be hungry. He glares at Stiles for a moment before sighing and shaking his head. Stiles turns back to his screen.

“You’re getting pad thai if you don’t speak up in five, four, three -”

“Green curry with chicken,” Derek grits out, and Stiles grins up at him like he’s won something. “Brown rice,” Derek adds, just to be a dick. 

Stiles nods sagely. “Of course, your body is a temple.” Derek snorts. “No, seriously, that wasn’t actually sarcastic,” Stiles says, clicking through the site for a minute and not meeting Derek’s eyes. “Your body is a literal temple, dude. Totally worthy of worship.”

It’s not something Derek hasn’t heard before. Hell, it’s something Derek works actively to maintain, but somehow Stiles saying it makes Derek feel warm to his toes.

“Shut up,” he says, always bad at taking a compliment, and Stiles clicks ‘submit’ on his order and clicks his laptop shut. 

“Twenty minutes or so,” Stiles says, and they pause for a moment, both suddenly struck by the enormity of the fact that they now have _twenty minutes_ to just… wait. “Um, you want to sit?” Stiles manages, his eyes darting around the small room like he just now realized Derek was going to _see_ it. 

Derek rolls his eyes and sits, not close enough to be touching Stiles, but close enough to feel how warm he is. It’s uncomfortable for a few long minutes, Stiles bouncing his knee up and down in the quiet. Derek stands up, getting more and more nervous just by proximity, and takes in the room. There are no posters on the walls, but Stiles has some framed photos scattered around on his bookcases, pictures of a younger Stiles with some friends, all of them laughing; a photo of a lovely woman in her early thirties, her denim jacket giving away her 80s fashion sense; Stiles at the Grand Canyon with an older man, arms around each others’ shoulders. 

“That’s me and my dad,” Stiles says when he sees Derek looking. “Family vacation after my graduation.”

“He looks -,” _ruggedly handsome_ , Derek’s brain supplies. _Kind, charming, like a good dad._ “- like you.”

Stiles ducks his head, grinning. “Yeah, I look a lot like both of them,” he says. He points to the other picture. “That’s my mom in her Culture Club phase. You can’t see it, but dad says her pants were basically gold hammer pants in that photo.”

Derek laughs. “I can’t believe she let you frame this.”

“Yeah,” Stiles says, and Derek cringes at the tone of his voice. He knows what Stiles is going to say before he says it, knows it in his bones. “She died when I was eight. My dad gave me that one when I was thirteen, said he found it in a box and wanted me to know that she used to be a fox.”

Derek barks out a laugh and Stiles tries to smile. “I know, gross, right? But she’s just so… whatever, _alive_ in it, I guess. It’s my favorite picture of her.”

“I can see why.” Derek drifts back to the couch. Stiles looks a little embarrassed now - Derek knows that look, the one that means he’s sorry for opening up a door of depressing shit. There’s no easy way to close it, and Derek’s opening his mouth before he can stop himself. “My parents are both gone. Car accident when I was sixteen.”

“ _Man_ ,” Stiles exhales, his gaze fixed on his own hands. “I’m so -,” 

“My sister lives here, she got guardianship.” Derek steamrolls right over Stiles’s heartfelt words, feels his cheeks heat. He doesn’t know why he volunteered that; he never brings it up, never opens that door. But he didn’t want to leave Stiles dangling out there alone in his loss. “It was okay,” he says, trying to smooth it over, take it back. 

“Yeah, no it wasn’t,” Stiles says, shaking his head, but he’s smiling ruefully and Derek knows he’s going to drop it, for Derek, for both of them. “What’s her name, your sister?”

“Laura.”

“What’s _your_ name?” Derek turns his head and pins Stiles with a look. “You’re really not going to tell me?” Stiles whines and Derek leans back and crosses his arms. They look at each other for a long minute and Derek can see the wheels turning in Stiles’s head, wondering how much he can push. Derek wants to see where it goes, what guesses Stiles is going to throw at him, when Stiles tosses him a curveball. “Hey, that’s cool, I get it. No big deal.” But his body language is stiff, like it _is_ a big deal, a huge deal somehow, and Derek can tell Stiles feels hurt. They sit for another long minute and Derek wonders if the whole night will be this series of uncomfortable silences. Then, “I’ll just call you Big Daddy,” Stiles grins, impish, and Derek’s eyebrow arches. 

“No, you won’t,” he says dryly and Stiles laughs. 

“Stud muffin? Hot stuff?” 

“Stiles.” 

“I will not call you Stiles, that would be gross and weird, dude.” The tension is broken, and the buzzer rings with their delivery order. “Saved by the bell,” Stiles smiles, wide and real, and Derek smiles back, relieved but also strangely disappointed.

*

They eat on Stiles’s couch and Stiles is back to normal, talking like he did that first night about anything and everything, forcing Derek to jump along the conversation with him, keeping either of them from getting too keyed up. Derek is barely keeping up with the odd tangents - something about Brussels and waffles and Parliamentary law - when Stiles skids into “That’s when I figured Ben was, you know, maybe kind of an idiot, and idiots have never been my type, so.”

“So?” Derek prompts before he can stop himself.

Stiles pushes his food around in the white, plastic container it came in. He shrugs but he doesn’t quite meeting Derek’s eyes when he says, “It didn’t really work out, with Ben.” Derek feels a whoosh through his veins, a prickling under his skin. “It’s not a big deal, we’re just not really all that compatible, I guess.”

“Oh,” Derek manages. 

“And before you ask,” Stiles continues, his cheeks still pink as he gathers up the detritus of their meal and dumps it back in the delivery bag, “it wasn’t the sex.”

“Right, that’s. Good.” Derek doesn’t want to know, doesn’t want to hear how the sex was good, how Stiles made Ben keen underneath him, how Stiles used his long fingers to open Ben up…

Stiles is fidgeting now, rubbing at his thighs, gnawing at one of his cuticles. “I mean, it wasn’t the sex because we never got to the sex. It just didn’t, I wasn’t - it didn’t feel right, you know?”

Derek freezes, his fingers digging hard into the arm of Stiles’s couch. This is Derek’s fault. Derek messed shit up for Stiles and Ben without even meaning to, just by being too _there_ , being too into it, too into _Stiles_. He shouldn’t have agreed to this, he shouldn’t be here, but he’s also insanely glad that Stiles didn’t sleep with Ben, even though that’s awful, that’s stupid. He’s such a hypocrite - Derek’s slept with a dozen people, more, since they last time he saw Stiles. (But he didn’t like it, he didn’t _want_ it. Not like he wants this with Stiles. Not like he wants Stiles to want it. Him.)

“I’ve totally freaked you out, haven’t I?” Stiles sighs.

“No, that’s - you didn’t freak me out.”

“Well, you’re pretty much impossible to read most of the time so I just -”

“You don’t have to do this, Stiles,” Derek says, making sure his breaths are slow and even, his voice pitched low. He’s giving this speech a few times before, to guys who called him out of desperation to just _get it over with_ , guys who were so scared when Derek touched them that they couldn’t even get it up. Stiles is still fidgeting, his fingers drumming out a rhythm on the arm of the sofa, but Derek knows that if he reached over, closed the gap between them that Stiles would lean into it eagerly.

Being ready for this step isn’t Stiles’s issue. 

It might be Derek’s. 

“Plenty of guys don’t even like it. It’s okay if you don’t want to -”

“I fingered myself a few times,” Stiles interrupts. His voice is nonchalant, like it’s no big deal, but he still won’t look directly at Derek. “I mean, Lydia used to use her fingers too, sometimes, so. It’s not - I think I’ll like it. I’m just. It’s dumb, that I’m nervous, right? You’re a pro, that’s why I called you, and Ben wasn’t going to, you know.”

_You’re a pro._

Derek is a pro. Stiles wants a pro because he’s nervous, because he thinks Derek can teach him something new, maybe something he’s wanted for a long time. The service probably _could_ have talked Stiles into someone else; Derek pushes that thought away quickly. Maybe he’s not what Stiles _wants_ , but so what? Derek knew that, deep down. All the fantasies he’s had about this night are just that - fantasies. But Stiles is right - Derek is a pro, and he takes grim satisfaction in knowing that Stiles is going to get exactly what he asked for tonight, and then some. What Derek can do right now is make this night good for Stiles, make it count, make it something Stiles won’t regret in the morning. “Stiles, c’mere,” he says, firm and sure and all the things Stiles needs, and when Derek reaches up to cup his jaw, to pull Stiles in for a kiss that Derek’s been craving for months, Stiles leans in with a groan, his hands curling hot around Derek’s forearms. “I’ve got you,” Derek murmurs and Stiles sighs against his lips.

They kiss on the couch for a while, both of them just exploring, relearning each other. Derek lets Stiles set the pace, happy to just be there, touching, tasting. When Stiles finally reaches for the button on Derek’s pants, Derek pulls away enough to manage a rough “Bedroom” against Stiles’s throat. 

“Yeah, yes,” Stiles gasps, and Derek gets them both off the sofa and down the short hallway, one arm snaked around Stiles’s waist from behind. The bed is made again, perfectly creased at the corners, and Derek smiles into the back of Stiles’s neck. “What do you -”

Derek turns Stiles in his arms and kisses him again, sliding his hands under Stiles’s shirt and up to thumb over his nipples. Stiles gasps and Derek pushes higher, tugs until the shirt is up and over Stiles’s head. He’s still so pale, more pale than he was a few months ago, and Derek thinks about Stiles bundled up in sweaters against the cold, thinks his nose would be pink from the cold, his cheeks too. Stiles is pink now, his lips lush and wet, his pupils dark as he looks at Derek. Derek runs his hands over Stiles’s sides, nails digging in at one point just to watch Stiles gasp. 

Derek tugs open Stiles’s pants and slides them down his thighs without breaking eye contact. “Sit down, Stiles,” he says rough and quiet, and Stiles does, sitting on the edge of his bed as Derek kneels to pull Stiles’s shoes and tug his pants all the way off. Stiles’s legs are a little hairy, tickling his palms as he runs his hands over strong calves to Stiles’s knees, pulling them apart gently. He didn’t get to do this last time, get Stiles worked up with just the anticipation, explore the mundane parts of his body with intent. Derek savors it, files the memory away even though he knows he shouldn’t.

“Oh _god_ ,” Stiles manages as Derek leans in to kiss along his inner thighs. Derek smiles into his skin. 

“Don’t think you have the market cornered on being good at this,” Derek tells him, pushing up the fabric of Stiles’s boxer-briefs and rubbing the stubble of his beard against the sensitive skin at the crease of his thigh. 

“Fuck, the way you look right now, I feel like I should probably sit down more.”

“Stiles -”

“I know that doesn’t make sense, shut up. You just. Oh my _god_.” Stiles slips his fingers over Derek’s shoulder, fingers gripping tighter when Derek leans in to nuzzle at Stiles’s dick through the soft cotton. Stiles is hard enough that he’s already leaking, an obscene little wet patch appearing in the fabric. Derek puts his mouth over it and sucks, uses his tongue, gets the fabric nice and wet. “Jesus,” Stiles gasps, his hips hitching. Derek hooks his fingers into the waist of the briefs and peels them down slowly, pausing to let Stiles lift his hips just a fraction so Derek can get them all the way off. Stiles is gloriously naked and Derek, kneeling between his knees still in all his clothes, thinks that anyone seeing this would assume that Derek felt completely in control.

Derek does not feel in control. Derek feels like his skin is on fire, like his heart won’t slow down, like he’s being given a gift he didn’t even think he could ask for, and Stiles is giving it to him with a smile.

Or a smirk. Derek catches Stiles’s eyes and he’s painfully aware that he’s spent the last few seconds frozen with disbelief. “Hey, cowboy,” he says, eyes bright, cheeks flushed, “enjoying the view?” Instead of answering _yes, clearly, you’re gorgeous, you little shit,_ Derek leans in to lick a hot stripe up Stiles’s dick from base to tip, catching a drop of precum on his tongue and pulling away just enough that it follows, connecting them for a second. It’s obscene, Derek knows, and he can’t help but grin at the way Stiles’s eyes glaze over. He’s about to lean in and do it again when Stiles jerks back, his fingers tight on Derek’s shoulder. 

“Wait, fuck, condom,” Stiles says, and Derek blinks up at him in confusion for a second before he remembers. Derek has a rule - Stiles _remembers_ Derek’s rule - and he doesn’t seem to get that Derek’s rules are all out the fucking window in this apartment, with Stiles spread open in front of him. Which is probably good, Derek thinks. _Someone_ should remember.

“You don’t - it’s not,” Derek manages, and Stiles frowns at him. Derek has no idea how to say ‘I’m pretty sure you’re clean and even if you’re not I just really want to taste you’ without ruining his facade of not-caring, so he reaches into his back pocket and pulls out his condoms and a few small packets of lube. He’s got more in his jacket if he needs them later, but he figures Stiles is a planner - there’s probably a vat of it in his nightstand, or tucked discreetly under his bed. 

He rips one open and tosses the rest on the bed for easy access later; Stiles watches as Derek rolls it down his dick, biting his lip when Derek strokes a few times for good measure. “That still good?” Derek asks, because the condom always makes things a little less intense, but Stiles just nods.

He resists the urge to show off; Derek has learned a lot of thing in the past few years, and giving head is at the top of his unofficial resume, but he doesn’t want this to be a performance. He wants Stiles to feel it in his toes but he doesn’t want to make him beg and squirm. He sticks with long, wet sucks, his cheeks hollowing just a fraction. Derek’s mouth waters at the sounds Stiles makes above him, panting grunts as Stiles digs his fingers into Derek’s shoulders, fingers tugging and pulling at the fabric of Derek’s shirt when Derek presses his tongue to the crown. 

“Oh my god,” Stiles keens, “holy fuck, baby, that’s amazing, _fuck_.” Stiles is so vocal as Derek sucks him off, and Derek is both completely unsurprised and also completely unprepared for what it does to him, egging him on, pushing him to take Stiles farther down his throat. Stiles has abandoned the idea of calling him Big Daddy, and just keeps calling him ‘baby’ over and over. Derek usually hates that, the endearment like nails on a chalkboard, but whenever Stiles says it Derek’s fingers tighten around Stiles’s thigh and his stomach swoops. 

Stiles finally turns frantic, his hands pushing at Derek’s shoulders with a “stop, fuck, I’m so close.” Derek pulls off with a obscene wet sound but instead of stopping he just leans up to pull Stiles close, stripping off the condom with one hand and jerking Stiles off in strong, sure strokes. “No, I can’t,” Stiles is panting his lips inches from Derek’s and Derek leans in, his other hand wrapping around the back of Stiles’s neck to keep him close.

“I’ve got you, Stiles,” he tells him, “trust me, you need this, I’ll make it even better the second time.” Stiles whimpers, his eyes squeezed shut like he’s mad about this but he also can’t fathom stopping. Derek grins despite himself. “Let me take the edge off, and I promise I’ll make it so, so good -,” Derek bites back the endearments that threatens to come rolling off his tongue, words he knows he shouldn’t say. “Trust me, Stiles, come on -” and that’s all Derek manages before Stiles comes in his fist, his body curling into Derek’s, his face mashed to Derek’s shoulder as he splatters come all over Derek’s dress shirt, his own bare chest. 

“ _God_ ,” Stiles manages, and Derek gives in to his urge to slide his fingers through Stiles’s hair, his thumb running in soothing circles against his neck until Stiles is breathing close to normally again.

They stay like that for a long minute until Stiles sits back and pulls Derek up by his shoulders, kissing him deep and sloppy, uncoordinated. Derek pushes Stiles back onto the mattress, rising to his feet in one fluid motion. Derek unbuttons his shirt efficiently, sliding it off his shoulders. “Oh yeah,” Stiles says, almost reverent, and Derek raises his eyebrow. “Oh come on, you know what you look like,” Stiles mutters, but he’s grinning, his head lolling to one side on the bed. 

“Come on,” Derek says, toeing out of his shoes and nodding toward the bed, “all the way up.” 

Stiles shuffles back on his elbows and heels, collapsing against the pillows. He’s still breathing hard, and Derek needs to touch him, needs to feel how warm he is. He leaves his pants on when he crawls after Stiles, kissing up his chest, over his shoulder. Stiles winds his arms around Derek’s neck, hitches his bare hips against Derek’s expensive dress pants, and it’s so unexpectedly sexy that Derek shivers. Stiles is looking at him again with those wide, dark eyes, smiling like he knows some secret about Derek. 

Derek has a lot of secrets. None of them would make Stiles smile like that.

“Turn over,” Derek tells him. He can’t look at Stiles. He wants to look at all of Stiles.

Stiles tenses up, but not nearly as much as he would have a pre-orgasm. As he does it, he watches Derek through heavy lids. He pillows his head on his arms, and Derek kisses his shoulder, his back. “You trust me, remember Stiles,” he murmurs, and Stiles nods against his arms. Derek kisses all the way down Stiles’ spine until he gets to the dimple in his back where his ass meets his hips, and Stiles is breathing harder, his fingers curling around his pillow. 

“Oh god,” he whispers as Derek rubs his chin against the swell of Stiles’s ass, “you don’t have to -” 

“Shut up, Stiles,” Derek says, smiling, and he presses Stiles right leg up and out so Stiles opens up for him, so Derek can lean in and slide his tongue against Stiles’s hole. 

“Fuck,” Stiles’s body jerks, and Derek does it again with a little more pressure. “Oh my god, are you going to -” Stiles asks, breathless, and Derek doesn’t answer, he just goes to fucking town. 

Derek loves getting rimmed - most clients don’t do it, but when they do it’s like a fucking bonus. Derek doesn’t actually love rimming all that much - with some guys less than others - but he wants to show Stiles everything, show him how good it can be. His tongue rasps against the fine hairs dusting the swell of Stiles’s ass and he uses his fingers to spread him open. He flicks his tongue in tiny circles, pushing in just enough to make Stiles push back against him. Derek’s stubble scrapes against sensitive skin, makes it pink and hot to the touch, but Stiles keeps writhing up against him, his eyes squeezed shut, his fingers grasping at the sheets.

Derek savors it, getting harder at just the sounds Stiles is making, the muttered curses, the sob when Derek’s finger runs over his perineum, slick with spit. He tramps down the little voice in his head that whispers that what Derek wants to do is ruin Stiles for anyone else, fuck him so good that everyone else will pale in comparison, make it so that all Stiles can think about is Derek. To make Stiles as miserable as he is… God, Derek is the worst person in the world. He stops and Stiles curses him out, his whole body pushing back for more.

“Hold on, Stiles,” Derek breathes, pushing to his knees and quickly pulling his pants open. He shucks them along with his underwear, kicking them off the end of the bed. He’s hard enough that he doesn’t dare touch himself, even by accident. When he looks back up, Stiles is watching him with hooded eyes.

“Hey,” Stiles says, his voice barely a whisper. “That was -”

“I said I’ve got you, didn’t I?” Derek talks over him, smiling through the butterflies in his stomach. He drips lube over his fingers, rubs them lightly down the cleft of Stiles’s ass. Stiles’s eyes flutter closed and Derek pushes in, his middle finger meeting almost no resistance. 

“Yeah, oh fuck,” Stiles keens and Derek holds still, waits for Stiles to push back against him before he starts fucking Stiles on his finger in long, deep strokes. A minute later he pulls out all the way before pushing back in with two, and Stiles curls in on himself from the pressure, the burn of it. Derek remembers how good this was for him when Stiles did it, remembers the feeling of Stiles’s mouth hot around his dick as Stiles opened him up. He takes his time, crooking his fingers until Stiles is jerking and gasping beneath him, turning his head to breathe deeply as Derek hits his prostate on every fucking stroke. “Come on,” Stiles pants at him. His eyes are unfocused, but his words are firm, unwavering. “You can give me more, I know you can.” 

Derek does. He gives Stiles more until Stiles is begging for him to do _something_ \- stop, go harder, _”just fuck me already, please, fuck.”_ His fingers slip free with a wet sound and Derek casts around for a stray condom, not looking away from Stiles for a second as he hastily rips it open and slides it on. Stiles is beautiful, his lips bitten red and his back flushed, glistening a little from where Derek’s slick hands had touched him. The want that surges through Derek is enough to make him feel faint for a second.

Derek push-pulls Stiles to his hands and knees, slides his his condom clad dick against the crack of Stiles’s ass a few times. He dribbles a little more lube there until it’s hot and easy, and Stiles’s ass is still twitching, waiting for him. “Last chance to back out,” he tells Stiles, because he doesn’t deserve this, he thinks Stiles has to _know_ that. 

“Are you fucking _kidding_ me right now?” Stiles pauses where Derek’s name should be. “I want it. Please,” he adds again and Derek is never going to be able to say no to Stiles saying please. He pushes in slow, so slow, and he can feel Stiles shaking underneath him, his hitching gasps, the tension in his shoulders visible.

“Breathe, baby, come on,” Derek says, not even noticing his slip-up, and Stiles takes a shaky breath, then another, until Derek is inside all the way, pressed against his back, his mouth hot on Stiles’s neck. Stiles lets out a low sob, and Derek slides one hand down Stiles’s arm and twists their fingers together. It’s still perfect, still too easy, and Stiles looks at their joined hands, says “fuck me,” and Derek does. 

Derek fucks Stiles in slow, long strokes, but Stiles’s knees keep slipping, his thighs vibrating under Derek’s. He’s hot everywhere but especially deep inside, and he makes the most exquisite sounds whenever Derek hits his prostate, a cross between a curse and mewl. Derek’s pulse races even though he’s not even pushing yet; he’s so hard, and Stiles is beautiful - sweating and gasping, his hand holding tight to Derek’s.

Derek is half-frustrated, half-worried he’s going to go too soon, blow his load before Stiles relaxes all the way into it and lets himself go. Stiles is half-hard still, but he needs time to get back to the edge and Derek is too close. He needs a distraction, and Stiles needs a hand on his dick. Derek wraps an arm around Stiles’s waist and hauls him up off his hands, pulls him back against Derek’s chest. 

“What -” Stiles pants.

“Come on, Stiles -” 

“Trust me, yeah, got it,” Stiles grins shakily over his shoulder and Derek leans back so he’s sitting on his calves, Stiles a too-heavy weight in his lap, his whole body feeling the strain. It’ll definitely be enough to keep Derek from the edge, and it drops Stiles further onto his dick until he’s bottomed out again, hissing as he settles back on his knees. “Oh, shit, I can’t, it’s too much.”

Derek tightens his arm around Stiles’s waist. “It’s okay, you’re good,” Derek murmurs in his ear as Stiles clutches as his hand. “Touch yourself, Stiles.” 

“Okay, okay,” Stiles gasps and wraps his long gorgeous fingers around his dick, stroking hard. He’s out of time with Derek’s thrusts, shallow from this angle, and after a minute Stiles groans in frustration and reaches back to grab at Derek’s neck, holding him in place as Stiles lifts up on his knees and back down, fucking himself on Derek’s cock as his hand makes hard, harsh passes over his dick. 

“Fuck, Stiles, yeah, that’s it,” he mutters against the side of Stiles’s neck. Stiles turns, twists enough that he can almost kiss Derek, their mouths sliding together at a terrible angle, but it’s enough to make Derek shiver. 

“You close?” Stiles asks, and Derek nips his bottom lip. 

“You first,” he says, and wraps his fist around Stiles’s, both of them working Stiles’s dick over until he’s shaking, his stomach muscles convulsing as he comes hard over both their fists, his other hand digging hard into Derek’s bicep. Derek can feel it, Stiles whole body contracting and stuttering in pleasure, and Derek just holds on, one strong arm around Stiles’s waist, his face pressed to the back of Stiles’s neck, breathing through his nose to keep from coming. 

Stiles finally relaxes against him, Derek still deep inside, Stiles’s head resting on Derek’s shoulder. “You’re still hard,” he says, his words slurred a little. 

“Yeah,” Derek rasps. Stiles lifts up on his knees just a fraction and sinks back down with a sigh. Derek’s fingers spasm on his waist as he can feel Stiles squeeze around him. 

“Want you to come,” Stiles breathes. “Wanna make you come.” 

And Derek is not a saint, not at all. If Stiles doesn’t want his afterglow, so be it. Derek tips them forward on the mattress until Stiles is spread out under him again, long limbs everywhere. “Yeah, fuck, come on baby,” he slurs and Derek’s vision whites out as he fucks harder into Stiles, faster, their bodies sliding together, and all Derek can say is Stiles’s name, over and over and over, until Stiles reaches out to twine their fingers together again, and Derek falls over the edge so quickly that he’s shaking apart. 

*

“Hey,” Stiles says softly, his fingers scritching through Derek’s hair. They’re tangled up together in Stiles’s sheets, and it’s been nearly an hour since Derek pressed soothing kisses to Stiles’s spine as he pulled out, since Derek cleaned them both up and tucked Stiles under his covers, since Stiles reached for him wordlessly and Derek couldn’t say no and climbed right back in to Stiles’s bed. 

They talked about nothing for a while, about a book Stiles is reading about the Cold War, about Christmas movies neither of them managed to see, about Derek’s battle with his neighbor over her early morning Miley Cyrus workouts. For the past few minutes they’d drifted into a comfortable silence, Derek’s cheek pressed against Stiles’s shoulder, fingers spread over his ribcage. 

“Hmm?” Derek manages. He’s not sleepy, but his body feels wrung out and his heart even more so. Stiles is so warm and Derek feels settled, calm in a way he hasn’t in a while. Stiles wants him to stay, so Derek will stay. It’s that simple. Derek wished everything in his life was as simple as this moment is, right now. 

Reaching down with his other hand, Stiles traces the edge of Derek’s tattoo. “You ever see them?” he asks

Derek flashes back to a cool California night years ago and goes cold. “What?” he manages, his voice a dull rasp.

“Brand New. I almost got to see them before I graduated from high school, but they cancelled the tour dates for some ridiculous Jesse Lacey-related reason.”

The band. Stiles is asking if Derek ever saw the band whose words he has scrawled on his body live and in person. Stiles isn’t asking about that night, about Derek’s biggest regret, about the look on the face of the cop who came to tell him about his parents. Derek turns his face into Stiles’s skin and breathes deeply. “Never got to see them, no,” he says. “Thought about it, but they were touring _Daisy_ and I just didn’t see the point.”

“Fucking Jesse Lacey,” Stiles says, but there’s a smile in his voice. “Is there a reason why this one is important?” He traces over the word ‘learn’, and Derek can’t answer that, he can’t - he lifts onto his elbow instead and leans down to kiss Stiles, slow and silky, his heart only slowing down when Stiles moves his hands to clutch at Derek’s back. Stiles shifts under him and Derek feels him gasp, a puff of air against Derek’s lips. Derek pulls back, frowning, but Stiles just shakes his head and pulls him back in. “‘S nothing,” he murmurs, “just forgot that might hurt.”

“Should be okay in the morning,” Derek tells him, sighing as Stiles presses a kiss to the edge of his jaw. 

“I hope not.” Stiles’s grin is wide and cheeky. “I’m paying for a memorable experience here.” Derek flinches under Stiles’s hands, and Stiles stills instantly. Derek closes his eyes in embarrassment. “Fuck,” Stiles says. “I didn’t - that’s not what I meant.”

“Yeah, it is, Stiles,” Derek sighs, steeling himself against the wave of shame that was too much to bear for a minute. Stiles is staring at him, his eyes wide and worried, his nervous fingers drumming on the mattress. 

“You’ve got to know how I -” Stiles starts and Derek shakes his head sharply.

“Don’t, Stiles. Just -” he rolls over and tries to sit up but Stiles pins him back down with one strong arm. 

“I’m sorry,” Stiles says and it hurts more when Derek realizes that he means it. “Don’t go yet. Just… stay. I want you to stay.”

Looking at his face, Derek can see the edge of something that looks like panic in Stiles’s eyes. He’s not going to move unless Derek moves him, and Derek… just doesn’t have the strength for that right now. “Okay,” he says, deflating, and Stiles lets out a breath Derek didn’t know he was holding.

“Okay,” Stiles echoes, and he turns on his side, his arm still holding Derek around his middle. They don’t talk again, and Derek tries to focus on anything but the hollow feeling creeping back into his chest. Stiles paid for a good time, and Derek gave him one, and this is just Stiles being… _Stiles_. Being cuddly and over familiar and pushy and awkward about saying the wrong thing. Derek strokes his thumb over the top of Stiles’s hand until Stiles relaxes next to him, and keeps it up until Stiles is breathing deep and even. 

He slips out from under Stiles’s arm and gathers his things, tugging his clothes on silently in the hallway. He doesn’t realize until he’s in Brooklyn, a few stars shining through the light pollution as Derek trudges up his block, that Stiles never paid him.

Thank god.

*

Derek gets a call from the service three weeks later that Stiles called with a message that Derek left something at Stiles’s apartment, and he should call about coming to pick it up. Derek had told the service he got paid just fine, and gave them their cut from his own savings. He doesn’t want Stiles calling back and spilling the beans, getting anyone else involved in this mess. He calls when he thinks Stiles will be in class, expecting the voicemail to pick up.

It doesn’t.

“Hi, it’s me,” Derek fumbles when he hears Stiles’s voice. There’s a beat of silence and then Derek can hear him smiling down the line.

“Oh, man, hi, I didn’t know if you’d -” 

“What is it, Stiles?” he asks, and winces at how sharp it sounds. _Please don’t bring up the money._

“Nothing, I just. I have this friend who knows people who knows people, and there’s a secret show, and I have tickets. Two tickets,” Stiles babbles and Derek closes his eyes and exhales. 

“Stiles,” he says, and Stiles cuts in “for Brand New, dude. Something out on Long Island, some charity thing. I have two tickets to see Jesse Lacey, and you’re coming with me.”

This is a terrible idea. Derek can’t go. Derek _should not go_. This would be - it wouldn’t - he presses his hand absently to his hip and remembers the feeling of Stiles’s fingers tracing his tattoo.

“Tell me when,” he says instead, and tries to tamp down the warm well of hope in his chest.

*


	3. Chapter 3

Derek agrees to meet Stiles at the venue. The day of the show, he spends most of it kicking himself for agreeing to this, but he takes the LIRR train from Jamaica Station out to some Long Island commuter town, cursing himself the whole way there. _This is a monumentally stupid idea,_ he thinks, _acted out by a monumentally stupid person._

But there’s another part of him that’s been not-so-accidentally surfing through all the Brand New on his iPod, even _Daisy_ , even the shitty _bootlegs_ of Daisy. He hasn’t listened to the band this much in years, and he’s surprised by how the music feels different in some way - the anger in him is muted, the sadness turned up. It’s dripping in nostalgia, the kind that would usually make Derek roll his eyes. But it’s not bad. It’s just different.

 _He’s_ different. He’s not the same fucked up kid he was seven years ago.

It’s comforting and terrifying all at once.

*

The venue is a shithole, tucked on the main street of a town that would have died out years before, if not for the fact that it was right smack in the middle of the Babylon line. There’s a hole-in-the-wall Chinese place on one side of the venue and a line of scene kids spills into the parking lot of the mom-and-pop hardware store on the other. Stiles is there already, in a black beanie and a red hoodie. He’s talking to some much younger kids in line behind him, his hands jammed in his pockets to keep them warm in the early March chill. Derek grins as he wanders up to the line. 

“Stiles,” he says, and Stiles whips his head around so fast Derek is worried about his neck. 

“Hey, hi,” Stiles says, blinking at him. “Wow. You came.”

Derek frowns. “I said I’d come.”

“Yeah, well. Yeah, you did,” he recovers. “I thought maybe - nevermind.” Derek wonders how Stiles could ever think Derek would stand him up. Derek’s thought this was a terrible idea for weeks now, but he never once thought about standing Stiles up.

And _that_ thought hits him like a ton of bricks.

“Hey, I have your ticket, doors open in less than fifteen, or at least that’s what they told us fifteen minutes ago.” Stiles is flushed and Derek can’t tell if it’s because of the cold or because of Derek. Derek’s thankful for his stubble because he’s definitely flushed, and definitely not from the cold. He nods and slots himself in between Stiles and the high school kids who were obviously expecting him. They grin at Stiles like they know a secret. Derek cautiously avoids looking anywhere but his shoes.

The line starts to move, slowly, and Stiles keeps glancing at him, but he jumps back into conversation with the kids in line about what songs they hope will be on the set list. “I know what song you want,” he says to Derek, eyes dancing as they flick down to his hip, and Derek mock growls and hip-checks Stiles hard enough to make him stumble and laugh.

When they get to the front of the line, a bored bouncer looks at Stiles and Derek. “Need to see ID.” Derek reaches into his wallet without thinking and passes over his now-expired California driver’s license. The guy barely glances at it before reaching out to hand it back; Stiles intercepts it, turning into the light from the open door and glancing down before Derek can even register the theft. 

“Derek Hale,” Stiles says, and Derek freezes like a deer in headlights. He tries to tell himself it doesn’t change anything, that Stiles isn’t a _client_ , not out here. That his name in Stiles’s mouth doesn’t make him ache, deep down. Stiles catches his eyes and he’s not laughing, just watching Derek’s face. “Nice to meet you,” he says, handing the scrap of plastic back, and Derek hopes Stiles doesn’t notice that his hands are shaking as he tucks it back into his wallet. 

“You too,” the bouncer says to Stiles, and the kids behind him jostle them forward a bit, grumbling. 

Stiles pulls out his ID and Derek steals it from his fingers. “Turnabout is fair play,” is all he says as Stiles squawks, and Derek grins as he glances at the name on the card. “What - are there even any _vowels_ in your name?” he asks, surprised. Stiles crosses his arms.

“Yeah, an ‘i’ and and ‘e’. In Stiles.” Derek laughs at his put-out expression and his crazy parents saddling him with that mouthful, and hands it off to the bouncer who nods before handing it back. 

*

There’s an opener, some tiny band that Derek’s never heard of. He plants himself at the back wall next to the bar. Stiles sticks with him most of the time, drinking five dollar beers. They talk about nothing - Stiles’s thesis, his favorite place to see music in the city - and they have to lean in to hear each other over the thrum of the bass. The smell of Stiles’s skin is enough to make Derek dizzy, his hand twitching in his pocket. He’s grateful every time one of Stiles’s new friends from the line outside drags him away to dance for a song, but he can’t take his eyes off him. 

“Dude, you’re scaring the kids,” Stiles laughs when he comes back the second time. “Stop it with the crazy eyes.”

Derek mutters an apology but Stiles looks secretly pleased, and he sticks close to Derek as the opener winds down and the tech guys come out to set up for main attraction.

“C’mon,” Stiles says in Derek’s ear before wrapping his fingers around Derek’s wrist and dragging him forward, into the meat of the crowd. Derek’s heart is hammering hard in his chest. There’s a palpable sense of anticipation, a slight forward lean from everyone in the room. Derek’s leaning too, waiting, with an itch under his skin that hasn’t been scratched in far too long.

When the band finally takes the stage, the energy erupts into screams. Stiles pumps one fist in the air and lets out a yell that Derek can feel to his toes. Derek is shocked to find himself echoing it. Derek doesn’t dance, but what the mass of sweaty people around him are doing can’t be called dancing. It’s primal - stomping, screaming, yelling out lyrics while reaching out hands like Jesse can reach them from the stage. Derek knows all the words, and he’s singing along with them without really meaning to. Stiles knows them too, and he moves without seeming to give a shit what anyone thinks. They watch each other as much as they watch the stage, laughing when one of them fucks up a lyric, lifting their hands above their heads to help some kid surf over the crowd. 

There’s never any rhyme or reason to Brand New sets, so Derek tried not to get his heart set on hearing any particular song, but when the first strains of Archers start up, Derek’s body runs cold for a moment. He knows all the words to this one too, of course he does, but his throat is too hot and tight to push any sound past it. He’s sixteen again, drunk and stupid and throwing beer bottles at the side of a big brick house. He’s seventeen, hearing his sister sob on the other side of a flimsy wall. He’s eighteen, fearless and useless all at once, gritting his teeth on a tattoo parlor table. He’s lost in it, he doesn’t even know he’s shaking until he feels a strong hand squeezing his, a chin on his shoulder, a forehead pressed to his temple. “Derek,” Stiles says, right in his ear, and Derek opens his mouth and he sings.

*

All told, the band plays for ninety long minutes, a rambling set that leaves the whole crowd overheated and disgusting, the sweat freezing on their skin as they pour out onto the street. 

“That,” Stiles says, his hands tucked under his armpits as Derek pulls his scarf on, “was fucking incredible.”

Derek just grins at him. The ache in his chest from Archers is long gone, replaced by a worn-out kind of exhaustion, the kind he gets after a long workout. 

“I’m really glad you came,” Stiles says, the words blurred by the wool of Derek’s coat as he leans into him. “Derek. Derek, Derek, Derek,” he repeats, like he’s memorizing it, and Derek’s chest aches. It’s been so long since anyone’s said his name like that.

“Me too. Stiles.” He only says it once, because he’s not in any danger of forgetting Stiles any time soon.

They sit quietly as the train rolls through the suburbs, the darkness out the window punctuated by dimly lit shopping malls and the platforms where more and more people stumble in and out. Derek realizes after a little while that Stiles is asleep. His head is a warm weight on Derek’s shoulder, their legs pressed together from hip to knee. 

It’s the nicest date Derek’s had in a long time. The train pulls out of St. Albans and Derek sighs. 

“Hey,” Derek says softly, jostling Stiles’s head with his shoulder. 

“Hmm?” Stiles blinks up at him. He looks adorably sleepy, and Derek can’t help grinning down at him.

“We’re almost at Jamaica,” he says. “That’s my stop,” he adds when Stiles continues to look baffled. His eyes are unfocused, hazy. Derek tries to remember how many drinks Stiles had at the venue - at least three, but possibly more. He definitely stole some of Derek’s vodka and soda at one point, on top of the beer. “You going to be able to make it home, Stiles?”

“Sure,” Stiles murmurs. “No problemo.”

Stiles has another fifteen minutes into Manhattan, and then a long subway ride up to his neighborhood. Derek pictures Stiles falling asleep on the train, or on the subway, or, worse, passing out cold in the the station. He’s probably not that drunk. Almost definitely not. But - “Okay, no,” he says and as the train slows into the station he puts his hand under Stiles’s armpit and hoists him to his feet.

“Whoa, hi,” Stiles says, laughing as he sways into Derek’s side, one arm snaking around his middle to hold himself upright. 

“Come on,” Derek says, tugging Stiles along the aisle and out onto the platform.

“Where’re we going?” Stiles asks, and he’s still so close that Derek barely feels the cold air.

“You’re coming to my place,” Derek tells him, and he ignores the traitorous twist in his gut, some kind of perverse anticipation of something Derek has no right to expect.

But Stiles just shifts closer. “Yeah?” he asks, “Am I getting lucky?”

“Lucky you’re not going to get arrested for public intoxication, yes,” Derek tells him, but he knows from the way that Stiles laughs, the way he’s walking close to Derek as they descend the stairs of the platform down to the street that he’s made a terrible, stupid mistake. Stiles isn’t that drunk - it’s not like Derek had to carry him off the train. Stiles would have made it home just fine. Now he has a grinning, pliant Stiles plastered to his side as Derek hails a cab to take them home. 

Derek’s never taken anyone to his loft, ever. It’s his sanctuary, the place where he can just be Derek Hale with no outside expectations. Laura is the one person in the world who’s seen the inside of it, and that’s only because she had a shit fit until Derek gave her a spare key. Now, that number will be doubled to two. Stiles doesn’t seem to notice the way Derek’s heart is beating too fast as he reaches out and takes Derek’s hand in the backseat of the cab. But when Derek’s thumb brushes the inside of Stiles’s wrist, Stiles shivers next to him, and Derek thinks maybe they’re both far more sober than he thinks they should be, far more nervous, far too impatient to get _somewhere_.

They manage to get into Derek’s building and up the three flights to his apartment without a word, an unusually quiet Stiles following Derek’s steps until the door is open and they’re both inside. It’s a converted factory building, so the walls are a rough-hewn brick, the floors poured concrete. It’s a wide-open loft, with old lead-glass windows that run nearly from the floor to the ceiling. Next to the front door is the galley kitchen with a small bathroom tacked onto the back. Derek holds his breath as Stiles looks around, takes in the messily made bed at the back wall, behind a screen that blocks it from the wall of windows. The rest of the space is taken up with Derek’s two vices - a corner of expensive exercise equipment, and a worn leather couch set up in front of a flatscreen TV. This is Derek’s real life, and Stiles, in his hoodie and his beanie and his dirty Vans, looks absolutely perfect, standing in the middle of it all. 

Stiles’s gaze lands back on Derek, his smile a little shy, and Derek’s body reacts without any thought at all. “Nice place,” Stiles manages before Derek’s kissing him, his hands knocking the hat off Stiles’s head so he can bury his fingers in Stiles’s messy hair. When Stiles’s hands curl into Derek’s coat, pulling him closer, they both groan. 

The kiss is only a shade below frantic. Derek can hear the blood pumping through his eardrums just like he can feel Stiles’s pulse under his fingers, in the spot where Derek’s thumb presses at the hinge of Stiles’s jaw. He leans into it, holds Stiles firmly in place as he takes a long second to suck on Stiles’s tongue. Stiles whines, and Derek’s answering smile surprises them both. “Derek,” Stiles pants into his mouth, but Derek just kisses him again, unzipping his hoodie to push it impatiently off his shoulders, then shrugging out of his own jacket. “Oh, fuck,” Stiles shivers when Derek snakes a cool hand inside of his t-shirt. “ _Derek._ ”

Derek isn’t even going to begin to pretend that hearing Stiles say his name like that doesn’t hit him like a punch to the gut. He wants to hear it again, and again, so he abandons kissing for a while to slide his lips over Stiles’s jaw, and down to the hollow of his throat. Derek sucks lightly, just enough to make Stiles gasp, and then he’s off. “Yeah, yes, oh my god,” Stiles whines. “Fuck, do you have any idea - Derek, shit!” Stiles is holding onto Derek’s arm tight enough to leave fingerprints through his henley, and when Derek bites down, Stiles actually shouts. Derek smiles again, a whisper against Stiles’s neck, and Stiles lets go of his arm to slide a hand around the back of Derek’s neck, pulling him back into a sloppy kiss. “I didn’t think -” he says between kisses, “I didn’t know if, you know, if you felt this too, or,” Derek slides a hand down Stiles’s back to get a handful of his ass and they both sigh, “fuck, or if it was all in my head -”

“Not all in your head,” Derek manages, and pushes Stiles back three more steps until his knees hit the edge of Derek’s sofa. He sits down abruptly, both of them shocked a little by the cold air rushing between them. It only slows Stiles down for a second before he’s tugging his t-shirt over his head and sliding both big hands up Derek’s thighs. Derek looks down at Stiles - his bedhead hair, his full lips, the blush that runs down his throat to his pecs - and he wonders how he ever imagined they _wouldn’t_ end up back here. 

Stiles grins up at him. “Come on, hot stuff,” he says and Derek shakes his head. 

“Stiles -,” he mock-growls.

“Big Daddy,” Stiles bats his lashes, and Derek whips his shirt off over his head. Stiles hooks his hands around the back of Derek’s thighs and tugs but Derek doesn’t budge. 

“Stiles -,” he says again, a little gentler this time, and Stiles blinks up at him.

“Derek,” he says, a little breathless, and Derek kneels up on the couch, straddling Stiles lap. Stiles leans in to kiss Derek’s collarbone, the swell of his bicep, his hands running restlessly over Derek’s back. “You’re so fucking gorgeous,” Stiles tells him, and Derek lets himself preen a little. Stiles is gorgeous too, his mouth lush and red, his big hands dropping to Derek’s thighs. Derek cups the back of Stiles’s neck and leans him back into the deep leather cushions. Their kisses get deeper, sloppier. “Derek, fuck,” Stiles murmurs, and Derek grins down at him, wide and almost lazy. 

“You want something, Stiles?” he answers, and Stiles’s eyes flash. Derek’s been hard in his jeans for a while now, but it was a distant feeling, less important than tasting his name in Stiles’s mouth. But when Stiles gets two handfuls of Derek’s ass and squeezes, hard, Derek’s dick twitches, and neither of them are ignoring it now.

“Do I _want_ something, he asks,” Stiles mutters, but he’s half-laughing too, yanking at Derek’s fly with one hand. “Like there’s any fucking thing I _don’t_ want -” 

Derek shuts him up with a kiss again, reaches down to palm Stiles through his jeans as Stiles tries to peel his jeans down without dislodging him. “Fuck, that’s not fucking _helping_ ,” Stiles groans and Derek laughs. 

“Helping what? Getting your hands on my dick, or my hands on yours?”

“Either,” Stiles grits out, his thumb pressing in really, really nice circles over Derek’s groin. “Both.”

“Come on, Stiles - you telling me you’re a shitty multitasker? You can’t figure this out?” 

“Fine, you quid pro quo us up, motherfucker, if you think it’s that easy,” Stiles grins back at him. Derek rolls his eyes and tips sideways on the couch, keeping his knees tightly locked around Stiles’s hips so he’s forced to follow. Stiles ends up mostly on top of Derek, laughing as Derek shimmies his jeans down his hips. Stiles gives him a hand, peeling his underwear down so he can get a good grip on Derek’s dick, and Derek tosses his head back with a groan. 

“Quid. Pro. Quo. Motherfucker.” Stiles says, punctuating each word with a kiss to Derek’s throat. 

“Pushy,” Derek pants, but his hands are on Stiles’s fly, then they’re shoving his jeans and briefs down in one rough motion. 

“Multitasking,” Stiles gasps as Derek’s palm skids over the head of his dick. “Oh yeah, fuck, _Derek_.”

And Derek is suddenly back on the edge, his dick jumping in Stiles’s hand enough to make them both groan. Derek wraps his other hand around the back of Stiles’s neck again and pulls him down roughly, his tongue pushing into Stiles’s mouth. It’s frantic and messy, almost competitive except that Derek doesn’t know if he actually wants to come first, or make Stiles come first. Stiles doesn’t seem to know either. Their hands are rough and slick between them, and not even Stiles can manage words by the end, both of them just panting between kisses. Derek sucks hard on Stiles tongue, barely even noticing what he’s doing before Stiles is keening into his mouth, shaking and coming with a shout that Derek just swallows down. Stiles barely pauses to get his breath, stroking Derek hard and fast, using the slickness of his own come between them to make the glide hotter, wetter, until Derek comes hard enough that the air is punched from his lungs.

When Derek comes back to himself, he’s squashed into the back of the couch with Stiles half-draped over him. They’re a sweaty, sticky mess, and Derek knows it’s going to be uncomfortable in a minute, so he lets himself enjoy the feeling of Stiles’s head on his shoulder, the weight of him, of his fingers tracing lines on Derek’s bared hip. It’s the hip with Derek’s tattoo. _What did you learn tonight, indeed?_ , Derek thinks to himself, and he shivers involuntarily.

“You’re never going to tell me what this means, are you,” Stiles murmurs, and Derek closes his eyes. “You don’t have to, that’s cool,” he adds. 

Derek feels like he should be grateful for the out; his throat is still raw from screaming the song earlier in the night. All of him is raw, actually, from the concert and the uncertainty, and the way Stiles has gotten under his skin. Stiles, who shouldn’t be here but who fits too well. Stiles, who doesn’t know anything about Derek, not really. Stiles, who would run screaming if he knew the kind of person Derek really was.

“It means actions have consequences,” he says, and Stiles lifts his head to look at Derek. He’s so close, Derek can count his eyelashes, can see the patches on Stiles’s face where his skin has been rubbed red from Derek’s stubble. 

“Actions in general, or…”

He leaves it open-ended. If Derek were smart, he’d walk away from this conversation. But Derek isn’t smart, and Derek doesn’t deserve this, and Derek isn’t strong enough to walk away on his own. He closes his eyes again. “When I was sixteen, I was seeing this woman named Kate,” he says, and he’s amazed at how easily he can picture her - the dark hair, the red lips twisted in a mocking grin. “She was older than me. By, like, a lot.”

“Nice,” Stiles says, and Derek hears the smile in it. “She show you the ropes?”

“Yeah,” Derek says, though all he can remember now is being terrified, of her laughing at his shaking hands, of how cold it was in the back of his pickup. “She, um. She dumped me just before Christmas of my junior year.” His heart is racing. Stiles’s fingers spread over his chest, his thumb brushing over Derek’s heart, slow and steady. 

“What happened?” Stiles asks. He’s quiet as Derek searches for the words. It’s not a complicated story, not really. Not for all the heartache it’s caused. But telling it is like ripping off a bandaid, and Derek has to brace himself for the shock of it.

“I drove to her house one night. Sat outside in my truck drinking beers and calling her, over and over. I just wanted… I don’t know. I wanted her to tell me why, I guess?”

“Makes sense,” Stiles says, even though it doesn’t. Even though Derek knew it was over for weeks, could tell from the way Kate had pushed him away, from the way she called him ‘Kid’ and shook her head at him every time he said he loved her. 

“It was stupid,” Derek tells him. “I got out of the truck. Took an empty bottle and chucked at the front door. I was just - she didn’t answer, and don’t even know if she was home. I still don’t know. Her brother comes out of the house, comes up to the truck, tells me to cut it out. I’d had a lot to drink by then and I… We got in a fight. On the street. One of the neighbors must’ve called the cops because the next thing I know I’ve got a black eye and I’m face down in handcuffs.”

“Oh man, ouch,” Stiles says, sympathetic, and Derek winces.

“They brought me into the station and threw me in a cell.” Derek can feel his whole body run cold as the night unfolds in front of him, aching and endless. “They called my parents, since I was a minor. They both got in the car to come for me, I don’t know - for moral support I guess? So they could both tell me what a fuckup I was? I don’t know…”

“Derek,” Stiles says, his voice catching, but Derek can’t stop now.

“It was 3am, right? And we lived on this hill, just off a nature preserve. No lights on the road, not even two lanes in some spots. And I’m sitting there, drunk in this cell, and they don’t show up, and they don’t show up, and I’m just cursing them out, because I figure they’re trying to teach me a lesson, you know? And it’s 5am, 6am, and finally the sun’s coming up and this cop is coming to unlock my cell, and I figure they’re here, they’re -”

“Derek,” Stiles says, a little more urgently, and Derek can feel the hot tears on his own cheeks, can feel the way Stiles is gripping at his shaking hand, but _can’t stop now_.

“It was a deer, a big buck, just jumped in front of the car. It might have been okay if they just clipped it, but my dad tried to swerve and the car went into the ravine on the side of the road, just went end-over-end a few times. And it’s 3am, and there aren’t any lights, and they just… it took a few hours, they think. It took a few hours for them to die in that car. I was drunk in a fucking holding cell, cursing them out, and they were just -”

“Derek,” Stiles practically yells, and Derek tenses for… something, anything, anything except the feeling of Stiles’s arms around him, pulling him close, of lips brushing his cheek, his temple. “Fuck, Derek -”

“I’m not a good person, Stiles,” Derek rasps through his tears, but his traitorous hands pull Stiles closer. “If I hadn’t - “

“You didn’t do that,” Stiles tells him. “You were sixteen and drunk and you _didn’t kill your parents._ Jesus _fuck_ , Derek.”

Stiles holds on to him, Derek’s face buried in the hollow of Stiles’s neck, and Derek lets his words roll over him and through him and around him. He’s been told that before, that it’s not his fault - he had a therapist once who made him write it in a notebook, over and over. Some days he even wakes up believing it. So it’s not like Stiles’s words are magic, but somehow they’re enough, in the moment. Somehow, Stiles just holding on is enough. When Derek tries to take a deep breath and all that comes out is a sob, Stiles just holds on tighter. 

Stiles holds on. Stiles, who somehow knows more about Derek than nearly anyone alive, or at least the important pieces, holds on and doesn’t let go.

Eventually, Derek’s able to blink his eyes open. He should feel mortified, but he’s so exhausted and overheated and _grateful_ that all he can muster is a hoarse “Sorry.” Stiles rolls his eyes.

“Come on,” he says, untangling them gently and standing up from the couch. “Bedtime.” He holds out one hand to help Derek to his feet. Derek looks up at him, shirtless and disheveled and flushed, and he feels his heart shift in his chest.

“You don’t have to stay,” Derek’s saying, because that seems like the right thing to say, but Stiles is pulling the down the covers on his bed and shoving Derek lightly down onto the mattress.

“God, you’re a moron,” Stiles tells him, climbing in right next to him. 

“Sorry,” Derek says again, but his eyes are already drifting shut and Stiles is a warm, solid weight along his side.

“I’m not,” he hears Stiles say distantly.

*

Derek wakes the next morning with Stiles sprawled over the other half of his bed. He would probably have more of a freak out about it, except his head is pounding. Since he didn’t actually drink much the night before, he chalks it up to a crying hangover. Derek rolls gingerly out of bed and pads to the bathroom. He takes a piss and downs a glass of water before looking at his reflection. He looks… strangely normal. A little puffy around the eyes, a little scruffy, but otherwise the same as he looks every other morning when he wakes up alone. Stiles staying over hasn’t fundamentally changed anything other than the way Derek feels when he opens the door and sees Stiles still there, asleep in his bed. 

It feels _good_. 

Derek walks over to the coffee machine and curses under his breath when he realizes he’s down to the cheap instant shit that he keeps around for emergencies. Derek doesn’t usually have coffee when he wakes up - he tends to make a smoothie before his morning workout, and only occasionally splurges on a dark roast when he passes the indie coffee shop on top of his subway stop. He mostly keeps the machine because Laura gave it to him as a housewarming gift. He glances over at Stiles and wonders if the shop is open already - it would only be a ten minute walk, and Stiles is dead to the world.

Slipping on his jeans and boots, Derek looks around for a shirt to pull on. His gaze lands on Stiles’s red hoodie, still on the floor where it fell last night, and Derek only feels a little ridiculous when he pulls it on and zips it over his bare chest, hissing a little at the cold of the zipper. It’s still cold enough that he pulls his jacket on over that, tugging a little so the red cuffs of the hoodie stick out the bottom of his sleeves. His hand is on the doorknob before Derek has the frantic thought that Stiles might wake up without him and assume he’s done some sort of fuck-and-run right out of his own _apartment_ , so he tiptoes back to the kitchen and scrawls “out for coffee, back soon” on an old takeout menu. He puts it on his pillow, so Stiles won’t miss it if he wakes up.

Even though it’s chilly in the mid-March air, the morning sun is warm on Derek’s face. He takes long strides, his legs carrying him along past the converted factories, past neighbors walking their dogs. He only notices them peripherally; his mind keeps drifting back to Stiles in his bed, Stiles on his couch, Stiles pressed against him at the venue last night. He can’t stop smiling. When he walks into the coffee shop, he orders two large coffees from his usual barista, a tall guy with a beanie and a full sleeve of tattoos. Since he doesn’t know how Stiles takes his coffee, he asks for an extra cup for some cream. The barista gives him a long look as he pours cream into a small white cup. “You look like you’re having a good morning,” the barista says to him with a grin, and Derek flushes a little.

“Not too bad,” he manages.

“Good,” the barista nods, grinning wider, and Derek wonders how ridiculous his face must be right now for this guy to remark on it. Or how miserable he must look the rest of the time.

A few minutes later, Derek’s got a cardboard tray with coffees, cream, and a generous handful of sugar packets. “Anything else?” he asks, and what the hell. 

“Two cider donuts,” Derek tells him, and guy drops them into a paper bag.

“Hope your morning continues to be not too bad,” the barista tells him with a wink, and Derek surprises them both by laughing.

“Yeah, me too,” he tells him, and heads back home, to Stiles.

*

Derek probably shouldn’t have tempted fate.

He’s trying to juggle his keys out of his pocket while not dropping the coffee or the donuts, and he hears Stiles’s voice inside his apartment pitched high and a little worried. He thinks Stiles is maybe on the phone, but when he manages to get the door open, he’s greeted with the sight of Stiles, sitting on the edge of his bed in just his jeans, his bare feet bouncing on the floor nervously as he’s stared down by Laura Hale.

“What. The actual. Fuck?” He grits out as they both turn to the open door. 

“She has a key, apparently,” Stiles says, his mouth twisted in a wry grin. 

“Yeah,” Derek practically growls, kicking the door closed behind him. “That was my mistake, clearly.”

“Oh, you don’t get to make me the asshole here, Der,” Laura says, her arms crossed. “I’ve left you ten messages in the last two weeks, and you haven’t returned _one_ of them, and then I show up and you have this -,”

“Nope, no, stop talking,” Derek tells her, crossing to where Stiles is sitting on the bed. “Get out.”

“Nope, no, go fuck yourself,” Laura practically hisses at him, and Stiles stands up and puts himself between them, turning to Derek.

“The note said coffee, but this smells like heaven,” he says with a smile, though Derek can see the strain around his eyes. Laura snorts behind him.

He takes his cue from Stiles and ignores her. “I didn’t know how you like it, so there’s cream in the little one. And sugar, which I figure is probably half of your diet.”

Stiles smiles wider and takes one of the cups out of the holder, plus a handful of sugars. “You’ve got me pegged, Hale. I like my coffee like I like my men - dark and sweet.” 

“Oh my fucking god,” Laura huffs and that reaction is enough to make Derek grin back at Stiles. 

“I”m going to take this and drink it in the shower,” Stiles says, waving the coffee in one hand. “That way you two can talk about me.”

“Stiles, you don’t have to - “

“Shut up, I’m multitasking here,” Stiles calls back, already closing the bathroom door behind him. It’s not five seconds before the shower turns on and Derek sighs at the closed door.

“Well, this is new,” Laura says behind him, and Derek turns to glare at her.

“What, the breaking and entering? Or the part where you’re a bitch to my friends for no reason?”

“Your ‘friends’?” Laura says, with little air quotes around the word. “Since when do you bring your ‘friends’ back to your apartment, Derek?” 

“He’s not - Stiles isn’t a _client_ , Laura,” he tells her. 

“He told me he met you ‘at work’, and he’s half naked in your bed at 10am, so excuse me for not believing you at all,” she tells him and Derek closes his eyes.

“I mean… he was. Once. One time,” because that’s the grand total of times Stiles actually paid him for sex. “After that it was… different.”

“So, what? You meet a guy who wants to pay you to fuck, and then decide to just fuck him for funsies?” Laura’s words sting a lot, but she’s also doing that thing where she curls her fingers into her palms and digs her nails in to keep from crying, so Derek takes a deep breath and tries to explain it.

“I like him, Laur. He’s smart, he’s funny. He goes to Columbia. He’s… good. I mean, he’s a good person.”

“Derek -”

“He took me to a concert last night. He’s bought me dinner,” he adds, because he figures the Thai counts. 

“So he’s just the world’s most adorable sugar daddy, is what you’re telling me?” She asks, but it’s more sarcastic than angry, and Derek watches her hands slowly uncurl.

“No, we’re just. I don’t know,” he tells her. “I _like_ him,” he repeats, because he’s terrible with words, especially when it comes to Stiles.

Laura exhales and sits on the edge of Derek’s bed. “And you think he likes you?” She holds up a hand. “That came out shitty, sorry. I mean, does he like _you_ , or does he like the aloof asshole you pretend to be most of the time?”

Derek sits next to her, eyes fixed on his feet. “I told him about mom and dad, last night,” he says softly. “I told him everything, and… he stayed, you know? So maybe - ”

“Oh, Der,” Laura says, quiet and a little sad. Derek’s brow furrows but she reaches out and squeezes his hand. “Okay, fine, I jumped to some conclusions. But you’re notoriously bad at taking care of yourself, little brother.”

“Yeah, that’s been pointed out to me before,” he says with a shrug.

“I’m going to get out of your hair and let you get back to your boy, but I am going to call later and you’re going to pick up the phone and talk to me, and next week we’re going to go out for lunch and talk about some shit, okay?”

“Including Stiles?”

“Yes, including - is his name really _Stiles_?”

“Yes. Mostly,” he replies. “It suits him.”

“Okay, fine,” she laughs, standing up and turning to the door. “I’m glad,” she says, turning back to him for a moment, her hand on the doorknob. “That he’s a good person. You deserve something good, Der,” she tells him, and then she’s gone.

*

Derek’s still sitting on the edge of his bed when Stiles comes out of the bathroom, a waft of steam behind him. He’s wrapped in a navy blue towel, tucked around his waist, and he’s still sipping on his coffee. 

“Not done?” Derek asks, even though he’s been holding his own coffee for the last ten minutes, too preoccupied with his conversation with Laura to drink it.

“Decided that shampoo and dark roast wouldn’t mix well, so I left it on the sink.”

“So much for multitasking,” Derek says, shaking his head in disappointment. When Stiles laughs, his head tossed back, Derek feels butterflies again. “I brought donuts,” he says, tearing his eyes away and holding out the bag.

Stiles walks up to him and takes one last, long sip from his coffee cup before placing it on Derek’s nightstand. “Hey,” he says, pausing until Derek’s eyes are on his, “everything okay?” His eyes dart to the door in a silent _’is your sister going to return and kill one of us?’_ glance.

“Yeah,” Derek says. “It’s okay.”

“For now?” Stiles asks, and Derek shrugs.

“She worries.”

“Yeah, no shit.” Stiles grins down at him. “That’s good, though,” he adds, and Derek just shrugs again. Laura worrying about him - anyone worrying about him - just makes Derek feel like a raging failure, like the fucked-up kid he used to be. “Hey,” Stiles says again, softer, and this time when Derek looks up at him, Stiles takes the coffee from Derek’s hands, puts the cup next to his on the nightstand, and leans down to kiss him.

Derek sighs into it. Stiles tastes like coffee and sugar, and his skin is warm and still a little damp from the shower. It’s _sweet_ \- not in some cheesy, romance novel way, but unlike nearly every kiss Derek’s ever had. There’s intent, but not enough to make it frantic, and Derek’s nervous, but the kind that’s right on the edge of excitement. He can’t pinpoint exactly why this kiss is different, with Stiles nearly naked and Derek still holding a bag of donuts in one hand, but it’s different enough to be remarkable.

“Is this okay?” Stiles asks, pulling back a fraction, and Derek realizes he’s stopped breathing for a moment. 

“Yeah,” Derek says, too fast, and Stiles smiles at him. 

“Scoot,” he tells him, and Derek shifts back on the bed enough that Stiles can climb up next to him, grabbing the bag out his hand. “You’re pretty good at this morning after stuff,” Stiles tells him after he’s had a bite of cider donut, snagging Derek’s coffee and taking a big sip. Derek laughs at his expression. “Why am I not surprised you like black coffee?” Stiles grumbles.

“It’s an acquired taste,” Derek admits.

“So, what you’re saying is, you actually prefer a caramel macchiato but you forced yourself to drink this out of some sense of duty to your abs?” Derek blinks. That’s… surprisingly accurate. Stiles grins at him and takes another bite of his donut. “It’s cool, I won’t tell anyone,” he says with a wink. “But you can feel free to drink girly coffee around me and I promise to help you work it off later.” 

Derek rolls his eyes, but he can’t help smiling. It doesn’t sound like a bad deal, when Stiles says it like that. Stiles hands the coffee back to Derek and maneuvers himself around on the bed until he’s laying down with his head on Derek’s thigh. He’s still in the towel, though it’s shifted enough that Derek can see the pale skin of Stiles’s hip. He reaches out and runs his hand down Stiles’s bare arm, eyes tracing over the dark spots that dot his shoulder.

“So,” Stiles says softly.

“So,” Derek replies, only sort of paying attention. Stiles has so much bare skin, and Derek wants to _touch it all_.

“I am reticent to use the b-word yet, but…,” Stiles starts, and Derek hums in question. “B-word. Like, boyfriend?” Derek flinches, cursing himself when Stiles bites his lip and turns his head toward the wall. “Yeah, I kind of figured - “

“No, Stiles,” Derek says, “it’s not… I’m not boyfriend material. You know that,” he adds when Stiles frowns up at him. 

“Because of the job?” Stiles asks, “Because I don’t care -,” 

Derek interrupts with a snort. 

“No,” Stiles grabs his hand and holds on. “I seriously don’t fucking care, Derek. It’s probably got its perks, and its shitty parts, like any other job, and I bet you have terrible health insurance, and it’s going to be hard to explain to, like, my _dad_ \- ”

“Hey, whoa,” Derek says but Stiles keeps talking right over him,

“But it’s your job. And it’s not like I can throw stones because _I met you because I called an escort service_ , and I really just… want to see you. Want to spend time with you. B-word or not,” he adds, squeezing Derek’s hand. 

Derek’s heart is racing. “Stiles,” he starts, but his brain is still trying to keep up with all of this. It’s not like he hasn’t thought about it; in fact, he’s spent far too much time over the last few months thinking about Stiles, in his bed just like this. But in his head, Derek was always the one looking at Stiles the way Stiles is looking at Derek, with a blush high on his cheeks, his eyes wide and hopeful. “You don’t want -”

Stiles lets out a groan of frustration. “Okay, let’s just assume that I actually know what I want, and that you don’t get to tell me how I feel about shit, okay? What do _you_ want, Derek?”

Derek looks at their hands, intertwined on Derek’s thigh. “I want this,” he says, squeezing Stiles’s hand, and Stiles squeezes back.

“Good, excellent,” he says, smiling, and Derek feels like he’s in freefall, like if he lets go of Stiles’s hand he’ll be lost forever. So he just holds on tighter. “So all we have to do is figure out the details. I figure your job is more an ‘evenings and weekends’ sort of thing?” Derek nods. “Okay, so can I have a day? Maybe one set day a week where I can hang out with you?”

“A once-a-week boyfriend?” Derek asks, because this can’t work, it _can’t_. Even though Derek really wants it to.

“No, an all-the-time boyfriend who I only see once a week because his job is very _demanding_ ,” Stiles says with a raised eyebrow. 

“Thursdays are slower,” Derek says, even though they aren’t, not really. He just remembers that Stiles doesn’t have class on Fridays, and Thursdays would mean staying up late with Stiles, and maybe waking up like he did this morning, with a warm, pliant Stiles next to him. “How about Thursdays?”

“Thursdays are perfect,” Stiles replies, his voice a little hoarse, and Derek closes his eyes and just breathes. “Hey, c’mere,” Stiles says a moment later, tugging on Derek’s hand.

Derek lays down next to Stiles, facing him, their knees knocking together. Stiles curls his arm around Derek’s middle. “That’s my hoodie,” Stiles notes. Derek blushes.

“That’s okay, right? I can take it off...”

“It’s definitely okay.” Stiles smiles. “But you should definitely also take it off.” 

Derek laughs, pulling Stiles closer. “In a minute,” he says, just holding on.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> One more chapter to go, already finished and with my beta. Sorry for the (2+ year) wait, lovelies. Just hope a few of you are still in the fandom to enjoy it!


	4. Chapter 4

Derek has never looked forward to anything the way he looks forward to Thursdays with Stiles. 

The first few times are a little awkward. Stiles takes Derek to the Whitney. He takes Derek for ice cream and a walk on the High Line. The third Thursday it’s dinner at a sushi place Derek knows Stiles probably can’t afford. Derek makes them go dutch, and Stiles throws his hands up. “I’m trying to woo you, here!” he says, exasperated. 

“You’re ridiculous,” Derek says, because he’s pretty sure he’s thoroughly wooed at this point. 

“I just didn’t want you to think that I think you’re a sure thing, you know?” Stiles tells him. His leg is jumping nervously under the table. 

“Stiles,” Derek says, leaning his arms on the table and looking Stiles dead in the eyes, “I want you to know that I know that you’re a sure thing, and it doesn’t make me respect you any less.”

Stiles pauses, then balls up his napkin and throws it right in Derek’s face. Derek laughs loudly enough that the couple next to them shoots him a dirty look, but by that point Stiles is already tugging Derek up from his seat by the back of his jacket and pushing him out the door. “You are _such_ a dick,” Stiles tells him, grinning, and Derek just hooks an arm around his neck and pulls him closer as they walk.

*

“So the sex is pretty good, huh?” Laura asks him over lunch the following Monday. 

“Excuse me?” Derek asks, a fork full of kale halfway to his mouth. They’re at the salad place near her office. Derek doesn’t know why Laura puts up the pretense of eating healthy when she adds bacon and ranch dressing to literally every salad they make. But Derek appreciates the way they chop the kale up fine enough that it doesn’t feel like he’s eating wallpaper. 

“With your boy. I mean, you won’t tell me anything about him other than basic, boring shit, so I figure the sex must be pretty spectacular.”

Derek makes a face at her. “You’ve never wanted to talk about my sex life before,” he reminds her. Laura has been exceedingly good about never, ever asking Derek about his work, not since she found out that his modelling was a little more than modelling, and they had a fight loud enough to shake the windows. 

“Your sex life is normally one of the most depressing things I can think of,” she tells him baldly, and Derek winces. “But this one seems okay, if he can get you to eat ice cream.”

“He’s pretty great,” Derek agrees.

“You mean in bed.”

“Laura,” Derek sighs, and she laughs at him.

“Fine, whatever. How’s your non-Stiles life going, then?”

He hasn’t thought much about his non-Stiles life in the past month, mostly because he kind of hates it now. Nothing’s gotten _worse_ , per se, but he spends a lot of time with men who aren’t Stiles, and he doesn’t really enjoy it. He thinks he used to enjoy it? Derek shrugs. “Same, I guess,” he tells her, because the last thing he needs right now is an ‘I told you so.’

She puts her fork down and frowns at him. “Derek, you know you don’t have to do this job anymore if -”

“And how the fuck would I pay the rent, Laur?” he shoots back. They’ve had this argument enough times that the rest can just remain unspoken, usually. But this time, Laura reaches out and puts her hand on top of his. 

“It’s got to be harder now,” she says, and he’s surprised to find real sympathy in her voice. 

Derek shrugs again, even though she’s just saying what he’s been thinking for a few weeks. That he liked his job just fine when he didn’t know what was missing. That he never hated having sex with strangers until he had something better to look forward to. Laura rolls her eyes. “You are a fucking terrible liar,” she tells him.

“Whatever, I’m a great liar,” he replies, and she flips him off. 

“Just so long as you don’t lie to _him_ ,” Laura says, and Derek nods. 

“Trying,” he says, and she sighs.

“It’s literally all we can do, Der, is keep trying. You and me and your boy, too.” 

They’ve had this discussion a million times too, but this time Derek actually finds his sister’s words kind of comforting.

*

“Hey, so,” Stiles says, and Derek looks up from where he’s reading on Stiles’s couch. Stiles is next to him, legs crossed and his laptop open on his knees. He’s been avoiding working on his senior thesis on their date nights for most of the semester, but it’s April, and it’s crunch time, and Derek finally convinced him that he didn’t mind a few hours of reading if it meant Stiles wouldn’t have a nervous breakdown about deadlines at three in the morning. Again.

“What’s up?” Derek asks, because Stiles looks nervous, his fingers drumming on the arm of the couch. 

“Um, I maybe told my dad about you yesterday,” Stiles says, not quite meeting Derek’s eyes.

Derek puts his book down slowly, dread pooling in his stomach. “Told him about me _how_ , Stiles?”

“Told him that I met someone who is awesome and great and gorgeous and who makes me hand in papers on time and eat real food?” Derek blinks at him, because that was a question, and Derek knows Stiles well enough that it’s about to be followed by a statement he may not like. “And, that maybe I met you though a slightly sketchy online outlet,” he adds, shrugging sheepishly.

“Did you use the phrase ‘slightly sketchy online outlet’ or am I about to be arrested by the Sheriff of Beacon Falls, California?”

“Beacon Hills, and no. And yes. Though I left it open-ended as to what kind of sketchy.” Stiles sighs. “I am actually really good at lying to my dad, but he’s also really good at figuring it out, so I try to stay as close to the truth as possible without causing him a long-distance heart attack.” 

“And did you succeed in avoiding heart attacks this time?” Derek asks. He pauses. “I mean, did he even know about you liking guys before this?” Stiles hasn’t ever talked about coming out to anyone, but he also never acted like he was ever ashamed to kiss Derek in public either.

“Remember that part where he’s really good at figuring it out?” Stiles shrugs. “He gave me a ‘son, you can’t choose who you love’ speech when I was in high school and a hundred percent sure I was going to marry Lydia. So I don’t think he was shocked by you being a dude.” 

“But the escort part -”

“He doesn’t _know_ and he’s too ethical to, like, investigate you, so it’s _fine_ ,” Stiles says, a little too vehemently.

“Stiles, why did you even -” Derek groans but Stiles is shutting his laptop and climbing into Derek’s lap. 

“Because he’s going to meet you next month at graduation anyway, and I wanted to give you both a heads up.” Derek freezes. “He’s a good guy, Derek,” Stiles says, a little defensively.

“That’s what I’m afraid of,” Derek bites out, because Stiles’s handsome, kind, very protective single dad is going to take one look at Derek Hale and realize what a fucking insane idea it is, someone like him dating someone like Stiles.

“Oh my god, relax,” Stiles tells him, cupping Derek’s face in both his hands. “You’ll be fine.”

“You’re telling me you’re pretty sure he knows that people pay your boyfriend for sex, and you think that’ll be _fine_ , Stiles?”

“He’ll love you,” Stiles tells him. Derek laughs, but he can hear the desperation in it. “Derek, he’ll love you because I love you, okay?”

Derek feels like the bottom just dropped out of the whole room. He looks at Stiles’s face, and he’s actually a little relieved that Stiles looks as poleaxed as Derek feels. “Stiles -” 

“Shut up,” Stiles tells him, a little sharply. He sits back, his ass a solid weight on Derek’s thighs. They just stare at each other for a minute. “Okay, so,” he says finally, “that’s a thing that just happened.”

“Yeah,” Derek agrees, because it’s certainly a thing that just fucking happened.

“You okay with it?”

“You want to take it back?” Derek asks.

“Don’t think so,” Stiles replies, a little wary. “You want me to take it back?”

“Don’t think so,” Derek tells him, even though he still feels like they’re in freefall. It’s only been two months since they started dating, and Stiles loves him, and Derek really, really doesn’t want him to take it back. 

“Okay, good,” Stiles manages. “That’s… good.”

“God, you’re terrible at this,” Derek tells him, trying to break the tension in the room. Stiles tweaks his nipple through his shirt and Derek hisses.

“I was wrong, he’ll hate you, you’re the _worst_ ,” Stiles replies, and all Derek can do is grab Stiles by the wrists and haul him in for a kiss.

*

Derek figures he should say it back. He really should. He thinks about it - on his way to clients, on his lonely subway rides home, while he’s working out in the mornings. He thinks about it whenever Stiles opens the door to his apartment with that thousand watt smile that Derek can’t believe is for him. He thinks about it when he wakes up to Stiles’s arm around his waist. He thinks about saying “I love you too, Stiles,” enough times that it should be easy. 

But it’s not. 

Derek isn’t sure he loves Stiles. Or, he thinks probably he does, but he’s not sure what the fuck that means. He’s not sure what it _changes_. It feels like it changes _everything_. And Derek doesn’t want this to change. His life now, with Stiles, is the best life he’s had since his parents died. So Derek keeps overthinking it, and worrying about it, and _not saying it_.

It doesn’t help that, over the next few weeks, things actually feel like they’re changing.

Stiles has a lot more work now that the semester is winding down, but he’s also jumpy, nervous in some undefinable way. Maybe it’s because Derek never fucking said it _back_ , and wouldn’t that be ironic, for Derek Hale to lose Stiles because Stiles thinks Derek doesn’t care _enough_. Derek has always cared way, way too much. That’s the problem.

Derek tries to ignore it, but this is a new kind of nervous for Stiles, one where he goes quiet for long stretches instead of filling the room with unstoppable chatter. So he tries to engage more, sending random texts throughout the week, asking about his classes, even dragging him out of the apartment to Mel’s for burgers on a random Tuesday. But Stiles replies to texts less and less, and has a hard time meeting Derek’s eyes over dinner. 

Derek would think Stiles is losing interest except for the sex, which is, if possible, getting more intense. He’s barely in the door some days before Stiles’s hands are on him, his mouth hot on Derek’s neck, his hands tugging his shirt up to slide underneath. Derek lets Stiles have whatever he wants, tries to say with his body what he can’t say in words - that Derek is here, that Derek wants to be here, that Derek loves Stiles and it’s fucking terrifying. Stiles fucks him and Derek comes with Stiles’s tongue in his mouth, both of them shuddering through it. Stiles looks at him with dark eyes; he looks terrified too.

*

Two weeks before graduation, they’re wrapped up in each other on Stiles’s tiny couch, watching Bob’s Burgers on Netflix. Stiles has his legs thrown over the arm of the couch, his whole upper body pressed against Derek’s chest, his head resting under his chin, Derek’s arm around his waist. Derek can’t see his face, but he can feel when Stiles goes still, his breath coming slow and deep for a few moments. “Hey,” Stiles finally says, “I need to talk to you about something.” Derek’s stomach swoops, but it feels inevitable, that he would lose this too.

“What’s up, Stiles?” he asks, impressed by his own ability to sound nonchalant when his heart is beating a mile a minute. Stiles can probably feel it. Derek flushes, embarrassed by his body’s betrayal.

“You remember how I was telling you about the internship I had last summer, with the Brookings Institute?” 

“Yeah,” Derek replies, because Stiles had talked long and loud about last summer, and how great his boss had been, and what a fucking moron the other intern in his office had turned out to be. 

“Well, you know. When you’re an intern at Brookings, you kind of have to apply for a job there as long as you can get a decent reference. And, I mean, almost no one _gets_ a Brookings job right out of school, at least one that pays a living wage, but you apply anyway because you don’t want to burn that bridge. So I put in an application back in March, and Dr. Stevens wrote me a letter of recommendation, and I kind of didn’t think about it after that because who gets a job at _Brookings_ , and -”

“You got a job at Brookings, didn’t you,” Derek cuts in.

“Yeah,” Stiles exhales, sitting up and turning to face Derek. “I got a job at Brookings.”

“That’s a good thing, though?” Derek asks, thoroughly confused. 

“It’s a great thing,” Stiles tells him, “except that it’s in DC.”

Derek blinks. DC is very, very much not New York. “Oh,” he manages, and Stiles reaches out and curls one big hand around Derek’s wrist.

“I applied before we were… you know, this,” he says, waving the other hand between them, “and no one gets a job at Brookings anyway, so I didn’t think about what would happen -”

“It’s pretty prestigious though, right?” Derek asks. “It’s not the kind of job you say no to.”

“No, it’s not, but I’ve been thinking about it and -”

“Stiles,” Derek says, only half-aware of his own voice. Stiles has a job in DC. Stiles is moving to DC. It’s fine, it’s nothing, Derek’s lived through worse. He’s just going to to have to remember how to live without Stiles. “It’s okay. I mean, I know we haven’t been dating for long so it’s not like it’s a -” 

“Oh my god, shut up, I have a whole thing here,” Stiles says, shaking his arm. 

“Stiles,” Derek sighs. “I don’t need to hear all the reasons to pick this job. You should take the job. You deserve the job.”

“I know I fucking deserve the job, that’s not the point,” Stiles huffs at him. “Look, I didn’t care about this job until it was in front of me, but now I really fucking care about this job. But I also really fucking care about _you_ , asshole, and I’ve been looking at the numbers and if I’m willing to live in a slightly sketchy neighborhood and commute a little farther, I can totally afford a one-bedroom. I mean, it’ll take some budgeting, but it’s workable, especially if I defer my loans for a little bit until we have a cushion.”

“What -” Derek starts, but Stiles steamrolls over him.

“And I know it’s not the same for you, job-wise, but if you want to keep your job I am pretty sure there are, you know, avenues for that in DC. I mean, I’m not expecting you to stay home and cook for me and have dinner on the table, mostly because I’m pretty sure you’re a terrible cook, and you should do what you want with your life, and I am in no way going to dictate your employment decisions.”

Derek blinks at him. He wonders how many times Stiles has practiced this speech because it sounds weirdly formal, polished somehow, but Derek still has no idea what’s going on. Stiles must be able to read the confusion on his face because he finally throws his hands in the air. 

“I’m saying that I want you to move to DC with me. At the end of next month. I know it’s insane, trust me, Scott and Lydia have both read me the riot act, but I think if I don’t ask I’ll regret it forever because you’re the best thing that’s happened to me in a long time, including this fucking job, and I really don’t want to lose you.”

“Oh,” Derek manages again, because that’s… not what he was expecting.

“Please fucking give me more than ‘oh’ Der,” Stiles says, and Derek can see the glimmer of panic in them. “Not that I want a ‘no thanks’ or a ‘this was fun, but you’re insane if you think I’m uprooting my life for you’, but even an ‘I’ll think about it’ would be better than -”

“I’ll think about it,” Derek tells him, and Stiles sags back into the cushions. Because Derek is pretty sure it’s a terrible idea, but he’s also pretty sure he’s going to be spending the next month thinking about it anyway.

“Okay,” Stiles says. “That’s… okay. Good.” They sit in silence for a few moments, Derek running through the conversation in his head, sure he missed something about _why_ Stiles would ask him to move to another city with him, when his life is just beginning, fancy new job and all. When Stiles can have a fresh start in a new place without the baggage of a boyfriend who fucks people for a living. “I have charts,” Stiles says. “Budget spreadsheets and research on neighborhoods and all that stuff, if you want to see it?”

“Okay?” Derek says even though budgeting is not really the issue here. They sit in silence for a few more moments, both of them just breathing, their thighs pressed together as they sit side-by-side. “How long have you working on spreadsheets?” Derek asks, just to say something, and Stiles laughs.

“A while, dude. I’ve been trying to figure out how to ask you, and I thought I could put together a whole presentation about how great it would be, but honestly it’s going to suck and we wouldn’t have much wiggle room, and I don’t care because I don’t think I can do this without you.”

“I think you can do this job without me,” Derek snorts.

“I don’t think I want to do anything without you,” Stiles replies, and Derek doesn’t have anything to say to that. “You’ll think about it?” Stiles asks again, and Derek nods, his throat weirdly tight. “Just, take as long as you need. Even if you decide, like, the day before I move. Or the day after. Whatever, I’ll make it work.”

“Okay,” Derek says again, and when Stiles reaches out for his hand, their fingers twining together, Derek holds on tight.

*

Laura laughing hard enough she chokes on her drink is not exactly what Derek thought he’d get when he tells her about Stiles’s offer. 

“Laura,” he says, exasperated as she sputters, still laughing a little through the coughs. “Laura, this is serious.”

“Yeah, I would say so!” she replies, wiping at her eyes. 

“I mean, I know it’s not a great idea, but it’s not _hilarious_ ,” he says, leaning back in his chair and crossing his arms.

“What? No, no, Der, it’s not hilarious, it’s _great_ ,” she says to him and Derek scowls. “Come on, you invite me over to your place, which _never_ happens, and sit me down with your ‘Everything Is Terrible’ face, and I assumed you’d _broken up_. Only you would put on that face when your adorable Ivy League boyfriend asks you to move in with him.”

“In DC,” Derek points out. Because yes, it’s insane that Stiles wants to move in with him in the first place, but asking him to move two hundred miles is an extra level of crazy that Derek still can’t comprehend.

“Whatever, DC isn’t far,” Laura says with a wave of her hand. Derek stares at her. “It’s really not!”

“It’s not _commutable_ ,” Derek points out.

“Right, which is why he wants you to move in with him. That’s pretty obvious. But it’s not like he’s asking you to move to the moon. Or even LA. It’s a train ride south, Derek.”

“It’s a terrible idea,” Derek says, confused as to why Laura doesn’t seem to get that already.

“Why?”

“What?”

“Why is it a terrible idea?”

Derek rubs his hands over his face. “Why is it a terrible idea to break my lease and sell most of my possessions to move to another city with a guy who I started dating three months ago?”

“Yes,” Laura nods. “That sounds a little… spontaneous, but you actually used to _be_ spontaneous, Derek. And you like him, right? I mean, you really like this kid.”

“Yeah,” Derek exhales.

“Do you more than like this kid?” she prods and Derek rolls his eyes.

“I don’t know. Maybe. Yes,” he finally concedes, and her grin is blinding. Derek doesn’t think he’s seen her smile like that in years.

“Then do it. Quit your terrible, soul-sucking job and move to DC. What’s the worst that could happen?”

“We move in together and get on each other’s last nerves and I can’t get work down there and he gets sick of me freeloading and we break up?”

Laura shrugs. “Doesn’t sound too bad,” she says and Derek groans. “No, really, hear me out. If that is the worst it could be, then you’re fine. You could move back up here, crash with me while you apartment hunt in Brooklyn. Even get your old, stupid job back.”

“Laura -”

“Now, what the best that could happen?” Derek flops his head back into the couch and sighs. “I’ll tell you - you move in with a great guy who clearly adores you, you start a new life with other human beings in it who know your actual name, you learn to cook things that don’t involve protein powder, maybe you guys get a dog. You get to be a real boy, Derek.”

Derek closes his eyes. “I don’t know if I can be a real boy, Laura.”

“Yeah well,” she says, leaning into his side and tipping her head on his shoulder, “you won’t know until you try, little brother. And I’m always here if it goes south, you know that right?”

“Yeah,” he tells her. His heart feels tight in his chest. “I know.”

“So, you should do it.”

“This is insane,” he reminds her one last time. She laughs again.

“Hales have always been insane, Derek, you know this. Just try being insane and _happy_ for once, okay?”

“I’ll do my best,” he says, and he’s surprised to find that he means it.

*

It’s the week before Stiles’s dad arrives for graduation, and Derek and Stiles are making the most of Stiles’s empty apartment. There are boxes all over the floor, all of them half-packed in Stiles’s haphazard style. The only things left untouched are the TV and Stiles’s bed, where they are currently naked and panting. Derek revels in the feeling of Stiles plastered against his back, his mouth hot on Derek’s neck, their fingers twined together as Stiles fucks him. Derek’s in a warm, hazy place he can only get to with Stiles; it’s safe, everything’s fine. “I’ve got you, I’ve got you,” Stiles murmurs above him, and Derek believes it. 

It’s not until Derek feels the jolt of Stiles’s fingers wrapping around his dick that Derek knows how close he is to the edge, and he falls over it without any warning, just a shudder and a cry he muffles by turning his face into the pillow. 

“Fuck, oh fuck,” Stiles pants behind him, and Derek grips his hand tightly so he won’t let go. “Derek,” Stiles keens, and Derek summons up all the energy he has left to clench his body around Stiles’s dick. “Oh no, you son of a -” Stiles lets out a noise which is half-laughter, half-groan, and Derek grins over his shoulder. “You’re a _menace_ ,” Stiles tells him, his thighs already shaking. 

“You love it,” Derek retorts, and Stiles doesn’t disagree. 

After, with Stiles curled up next to him, one long leg thrown over Derek’s, the weight of it almost uncomfortable, Derek takes a deep breath and lets it out slowly. “So,” he says, not looking at Stiles at all, “I talked to the guy who does scheduling today. Told him he’s going to need to reschedule some stuff.”

“Yeah?” Stiles says, his voice already sleep-rough. “Does that mean I’ll get to see more of you before next week’s insanity?”

Derek’s body runs hot for a moment - he’s not sure why he’s so nervous about this; it was Stiles’s idea to begin with. But somehow Derek feels exposed in a way he hasn’t for months. They haven’t really talked about Derek moving to DC since the night Stiles asked. What if he changed his mind? Stiles reaches out for Derek’s hand, and Derek grabs on like a lifeline. “Hey,” Stiles says, a little more awake now. “What’s -”

“I actually told him he’d have to reschedule everything starting next month.” Derek pushes the words out in a rush. 

Stiles grips his hand tight. “Derek -”

“I also told my landlord I’d be out by the end of June,” he adds. “So, your boyfriend is about to be homeless and unemployed. Hope you’re happy,” he adds with a shaky smile.

“Fuck, Derek,” Stiles says, rolling over and wrapping him in a bear hug. “I am grossly, stupidly happy.” His face is pressed to Derek’s clavicle, and Derek can feel the wide smile against his skin. Stiles props himself up on one elbow and kisses Derek, slow and wet. “I was so worried you were just trying to figure out a way to say no without hurting my feelings,” he says, their noses brushing. 

“I still think it’s crazy,” Derek tells him plainly. Stiles just grins.

“At least we’ll be crazy together.”

*

Derek arrives at Stiles’s apartment at eight-thirty am on his graduation day, despite having gotten home from a job only six hours before. He’s in a suit that’s just a little too warm for mid-May, but it’s his best suit, a navy blue that he hopes makes him look like a respectable person and not… like himself. Stiles answers the door with wild eyes, his robe already on, his hair a ridiculous mess. “Oh my god, have you seen my mortarboard?” he asks in a rush. Derek blinks.

“Um, no?” 

“No, obviously, you just got here,” Stiles sighs. He takes a step forward and hugs Derek around the waist. “Hi, sorry,” he mumbles into Derek’s shoulder. Derek kisses the side of his head. 

A tall man Derek instantly recognizes appears behind Stiles, picking his way through the mostly-packed boxes littering the hallway. “Welcome to the insanity,” he says with a wry smile. “This one’s only been up for an hour and he’s had three cups of coffee, so fair warning.”

“Dad,” Stiles says with an eyeroll. 

“Don’t you still have a mortarboard to find?” his dad asks and Stiles curses and flies back into the apartment, leaving them alone in the hallway.

“Sir,” Derek says, holding out a hand for Stiles’s dad to shake. His hand isn’t shaking, but he’s pretty sure it’s still clammy. He mentally curses himself for not wiping them down on his pants, but then reminds himself that respectable people don’t wipe their sweaty hands on their pants.

“I’d say you can call me John, but I don’t want you to mix me up with my son,” Stiles’s dad says, with the hint of a smile. It takes Derek a second to catch up, and when he does he flushes to his toes.

“Oh my god, Dad,” Stiles yells from the bedroom.

“It was a joke,” Stiles’s dad yells back, “I’m not traumatizing him.”

Stiles reappears in the hallway, his graduation cap finally in hand. He’s glaring. “You can’t just -”

“Sorry, kid, sorry,” his dad says, shaking his head. 

“He’s my boyfriend, dad.”

“I know, and you’re right - he’s _very_ handsome,” Mr. Stilinski says with a straight face. Derek flushes again, but he’s getting the idea that Stiles’s dad is trying to get a rise out of Stiles more than he’s trying to embarrass Derek. It’s working, too - Stiles throws his hands in the air with an inarticulate groan that makes Derek smile despite himself. 

“Dad, _no_ ,” Stiles pleads. But Derek figures if he wants to get on Stiles’s dad’s good side, he needs to pick his battles.

“You don’t think I’m handsome, Stiles?” he says, putting his hand to his chest like he’s wounded. 

“Of course I -” Stiles starts and then see Derek’s grin. “Oh, fuck you,” he says, pointing at Derek with his hat. “I need someone to be on my side here!”

“I’m always on your side, Stiles,” Mr. Stilinski grins at him. “And your boyfriend and I will have plenty of time to get to know each other while you line up for the ceremony.” He glances at Derek and Derek’s stomach swoops. “Ah, I see he’s appropriately terrified of that idea.”

“Dad, be nice,” Stiles admonishes his father, and Mr. Stilinski puts his hands up in surrender. 

A few more minutes of familial banter later and Stiles is ready to go, his phone shoved in his pocket and his mortarboard in his hand. His dad pockets their graduation tickets. Derek stays in the hallway and tries not to be in the way in the tiny apartment. “He doesn’t talk much,” Mr. Stilinski says, almost as an aside. 

“He talks plenty when other people aren’t taking up all the oxygen in the room,” Stiles replies.

“So he doesn’t talk much around _you_ ,” his dad says with a nod. Derek snorts, because hey - he’s not wrong. 

“You really do deserve each other,” Stiles snaps, and herds them all out the door.

The ceremony is long and as he’d feared, Derek is just a little too warm, sitting in the sun in his dark suit. He feels his phone buzz before they even sit down, and Stiles keeps a running stream of text messages to him, and to his dad. Derek’s are a lot of reassurances that his dad is really a great person and not to take any of the teasing personally. His dad’s are a litany of admonishments to keep his mouth shut about ‘literally everything dad, just be mute, be a mute mime okay?’ Derek knows this because Mr. Stilinski tips his screen over to Derek when Stiles starts his tirade and says “Tell him I just asked you for very specific details about your first date.”

“Do you really want to know details about our first date?” Derek asks, panicking a little. Because their first date could be counted as the time his son fucked Derek senseless without knowing his real name. Or it could be the time Derek confessed his darkest secrets and cried on Stiles for an hour. Neither of those are parent-friendly stories. 

“Oh god, no,” Mr. Stilinski says vehemently. “I just want to see if we can get him to devolve into those little pictures of bombs and knives before the keynote.”

Derek laughs out loud, and between the two of them, they troll Stiles hard enough that he’s threatening to murder them both (complete with knife emojis) by the time his class is called to stand. At that point, Mr. Stilinski and Derek are both on their feet, clapping as they all complete their tassel flips and hat tosses, and cheering along with two thousand Columbia graduates and their families. 

*

“Well, this is -” Derek starts, and Stiles silences him with a look. 

“A little shaggy, I know,” he grits out, hefting another of Derek’s boxes up the stairs of their new apartment. 

“I was going to say ‘not so bad’,” Derek grins at him, taking the box and adding to the pile in the bedroom. 

They’re just over the DC border in Maryland, in an apartment complex of old brick colonials. There are kids running around outside, and bikes stashed in the foyer. The interior is painted a flat beige, and the carpet has seen better days. But it’s spacious enough - Derek’s so used to New York real estate prices that he figured they’d be living in a hole in the ground. There’s a small kitchen with a cut-out in the wall to look into the living room, and a bedroom with two big closets. 

“Well, good, because it’s the only place I could find in my price range that was on a subway line,” Stiles reminds him. 

Derek snorts. “Metro Line?”

“Fucking whatever, the thing that goes underground.” After four years in New York, Stiles had been pretty adamant about taking the Red Line into work and not the bus. Derek doesn’t mind - he’s happy for some mobility too, especially once he figures out his work contacts in the city. 

Between the two of them, Derek and Stiles have enough furniture to fill the place. When they finally finish unloading the truck, and then returning the truck, and then trekking the mile back to their new apartment, it’s after dark and Derek just wants to lay down on the unmade bed and never move again. Stiles flops down on the mattress next to him, face first, with a groan. 

“Let’s not do that again,” he says.

“No,” Derek agrees, “we live here forever now.”

“Okay, cool.” Derek smiles at the ceiling. A long minute later Stiles pokes him in the shoulder. “I know I said on the way down that we couldn’t go to sleep without christening every room in the house -”

“Stiles, there is literally no way that is happening tonight.”

“Oh, thank god,” Stiles exhales and Derek laughs.

“The romance is already dead,” he jokes but Stiles reaches down to hold on to his hand. 

“Nah,” he says, “the romance is just tired. And hungry. Do you think the romance would like some pizza?”

“I think the romance would enjoy pizza,” Derek nods. “And also a shower.”

“Excellent,” Stiles says, pushing himself up until he’s sitting on the edge of the bed. “I’ll figure out where to get pizza delivery in this town while you shower, then I’ll shower and you can make the bed. Then we eat pizza, and get in the bed, and don’t get up at all tomorrow.” He gets up and, using his bare hands, rips open a box marked ‘OPEN ME FIRST’ and pulls out some towels and sheets and a bottle of Head and Shoulders. 

Derek’s eyebrows raise to his hairline. “How come in this scenario I am the one who has to do actual work while you’re the one who has to google things?”

“Because in this as in all situations, you are the Clark Kent, able to leap buildings in a single bound, and I am the Jimmy Olsen, who cheers you on.”

“You’re not the Lois Lane?” Derek asks, getting up and pulling his shirt over his head. 

“Dude, no, I am never the Lois Lane. Maybe in some universe of hate-sex I’m the Lex Luthor…,” Derek grabs the towels and disappears into the bathroom before Stiles can fall further down that rabbit hole. 

They eat pizza that is probably mediocre, but tastes amazing after the long day they’ve had. They decided to keep Derek’s couch and not Stiles’s, so it’s long enough for them both to stretch out on, their feet tangled together in the middle. Derek takes in the rest of the room - Stiles’s bookshelves, Derek’s industrial blender, Stiles’s TV stand, Derek’s free weights and bench. The free weights are the only gym equipment Derek kept - everything else in his loft was too bulky to make the journey south. He sold it all to a guy on Craigslist the week before. 

“Hey,” Stiles pokes him in the thigh with his foot. “Penny for your thoughts?”

“Gotta remember to find a gym nearby,” Derek replies, stretching his arms over his head.

“Profound,” Stiles grins.

“If you wanted profound, you should have moved in with one of your Columbia friends.”

“Are you kidding? None of them would be crazy enough to live with me.” 

Derek laughs. “Unlike me, huh?”

“Oh, buddy,” Stiles says, putting his paper plate on the floor and shifting to his knees, “you are certifiable.” He leans down to kiss Derek, his hands bracketing Derek’s head on the armrest, and Derek sighs happily. He’s almost definitely certifiable, but in this moment, surrounded by all their stuff mixed in this new place, it doesn’t feel like he made the wrong decision at all. He hears the echo of Laura saying ‘I told you so’ in the back of his head but it’s pushed away by a groan from Stiles. “No, okay, I want to make out with you so bad, but my arms are like jello and I’m about to fall on your face.” 

“Come on, bed,” Derek says, pushing them both to their feet. “I made it up special, just for you.”

“You’re the best, Clark,” Stiles sighs, leaning heavily against Derek’s shoulder.

They collapse into bed wearing nothing but their underwear, covered in just the sheet in deference to the warm June air. “Makeouts?” Stiles asks, even though his eyes are already closing.

“Sleep,” Derek tells him. 

“‘Kay,” Stiles breathes into his shoulder. “Love you.”

“Love you too,” Derek whispers, and lays awake for a few long moments marveling at how easy it was to say.

*

By the end of August, Derek and Stiles have a routine. About fifty percent of the time, Derek can manage to drag Stiles out of bed early to go on a run with him. The rest of the time, he gets back from his run to find Stiles already showered and dressed for work - Stiles wears _suits_ to work, which Derek finds both ridiculous and hot - and Derek makes breakfast before his shower, because otherwise Stiles would subsist on coffee and poptarts.

Derek hasn’t found any clients yet. Stiles never mentions it, and Derek never brings it up either. Derek’s halfway through the money he’d saved up over the last few years, and what he got from selling some of his things when they moved. He should be making contacts. He should be looking for work. But somehow he’s… not. There’s a weird kind of tension in the apartment around money - Stiles just leaves money in a bowl in the kitchen “for necessities” and asks Derek to do the shopping. It’s not the same as when he was escorting, not in the slightest, but Derek still feels weird every time he picks it up. He needs to be contributing. He needs to be doing _something_. But he’s not feeling… ready to find clients yet, and he doesn’t exactly have the kind of work experience you can put on a resume.

Stiles heads for the Metro by eight am, and Derek cleans up from breakfast and watches Judge Judy until he gets restless. Some days he goes out to do the shopping. Sometimes he finds a random job in the neighborhood on Task Rabbit, and manages to make some cash of his own to throw in the bowl. But most days Derek heads the six blocks to Ultra, the local gym he found back in June. He paid for a basic membership using some of the money he got from selling his old equipment. It’s a good gym - not flashy or commercial, with solid equipment and a few classrooms. There are always people there, but in the quiet hours of the daytime, Derek can use the machines he wants, and even get in some time on the punching bags in the small corner set up for boxing.

“Hey Derek,” Susan calls out from the front desk as he arrives just after the lunch rush on Wednesday. She’s a sunny blond with a killer right hook, and always has a few minutes to chat with Derek. At the start she was flirting, but Derek dropped enough mentions of Stiles that she got the hint pretty quickly. Derek was pleased when she easily just slid him into the ‘friend’ category without any drama. “Mrs. Lewis was asking if you would be around today,” she says with a wink.

“You told her I don’t work here, right?” Derek sighs, but when he scans the room and sees her waving to him, he smiles. Mrs. Lewis is in her late 50’s and diabetic, and when her doctor gave her the choice between giving up sugar entirely and joining a gym, she reluctantly joined Ultra. Derek found her working out on one of the leg lift machines a few months ago, and her technique was so awful he had to step in and give her some pointers. The week after that, he helped her figure out some warm-ups that wouldn’t aggravate her lower back. Now, she looks to Derek for advice on all her workouts. He doesn’t mind it - it’s been nice to help someone out, and she’s started bringing him cookies as a thank you.

“I actually meant to talk to you about that,” Susan replies and Derek blinks at her. “You know Danny’s moving to Miami?” Derek nods - Danny’s one of the trainers at Ultra, but his cousin is opening a gym in Florida and Susan told Derek last week that Danny was leaving to work there. “Well, that puts us down a trainer, and we could do a whole search for one, but you’re already always _here_...”

“Are you… offering me job?” Derek asks, shocked. 

“I’m not, but Stan is.” She points to the second floor back office, with it’s large paned window overlooking the gym, where the owner of Ultra is sitting behind his desk, doing paperwork. “Go, talk to him!” Susan laughs, shooing him away. 

Derek’s heart is racing when he reaches Stan’s office. He doesn’t actually know Stan that well; just enough to shake hands in passing a few times, share a few jokes over the free weights. It doesn’t make any _sense_ , that Stan would offer him a job. By the time he’s turning the handle, Derek’s mostly convinced himself that Susan is delusional. 

Twenty minutes later, Derek is staring at the packet of employment paperwork in his hands and Stan is clapping him on the shoulder. “Welcome to the team, Hale,” he says, and Derek just blinks up at him, still stunned.

“I don’t - thank you?” he manages, and Stan just laughs at him. 

“Don’t thank me, we’re going to make you work for it,” he says. “New guy always gets the early shift.”

Derek thinks about his mornings with Stiles, making breakfast and fixing his tie and feeling so _useless_ as Stiles heads out the door. “Not a problem,” he says, and he means it.

Derek has a _job_ , where he gets to help people and get paid for it. It’s going to pay a hell of a lot less than his escorting gig, but, even with the early shift, the hours will be better and he’ll have health insurance and he’ll get to go home to Stiles every night. Just Stiles. Derek’s aware that he’s grinning and he knows he should be more professional, but he can’t _stop_. Stan just laughs again.

“Okay, okay, go tell Mrs. Lewis the good news. I have a feeling you already have your first personal trainer client in the bag.”

“Yes, I - thank you again,” Derek says and heads out to the main floor, dazed and happy.

*

“Yo!” Stiles calls out as he comes in the door. “I think Carolina is cooking something amazing again, we should go see if she’s got - hey,” he stops abruptly, taking in the scene in front of him. 

Derek’s in his best suit, leaning back against the breakfast bar. Their small dining table is set for two, with a candle in the center. There’s chicken piccata on the stove, the smell of lemon and white wine and garlic filling the room. “Hey,” Derek says. 

“You cooked,” Stiles says, looking a little stunned.

“I cook a lot,” Derek reminds him, and Stiles rolls his eyes. 

“First, making granola is not cooking. Second, there are _candles_.”

“There is one candle. And I had to blow it out because it smelled like sugar.”

“It smells like vanilla cupcakes, and that is not answering _any_ of my questions, here.”

Derek just grins at him, walking forward and taking Stiles’s messenger bag off his shoulder. “Come on, sit,” he says, dropping the bag on the couch and taking Stiles’s hand. He walks him the ten steps to the table, and pulls out a chair for him. “So, I have news,” he says, once Stiles is seated and Derek’s back in the kitchen, plating up the chicken and sauce with some linguine.

“Yeah, no shit,” Stiles replies, and Derek looks up sharply at the tightness in his voice. 

“It’s good news, Stiles,” Derek tells him. 

“Sure, right.” Stiles nods. 

Derek puts down the plates on the table and sits across from him. He was going to wait, but Stiles seems nervous, his knee jumping under the table. “I got a job today,” he says plainly, and he can’t help the grin spreading on his face.

“That’s… good. Great,” Stiles says, but his smile is forced. 

“You’re mad.” Derek’s been thinking about this all day, about sharing his good news with Stiles, about celebrating with good food and the fudge Mrs. Lewis gave him and maybe some celebratory sex on the couch. Never did he think Stiles would be _mad_ at him. He doesn’t know what to do.

“No, not mad,” Stiles says, taking a deep breath and letting it out. “Not… it’s not my place to be mad, so I’m not mad. Just… I thought maybe. Nevermind,” he says, exhaling again and smiling at Derek - a real one, small and just a little sad. “I’m happy. I know you were going nuts here, alone all day. I’m glad you have something going on that isn’t just me and the gym.”

“Well, sorry to tell you,” Derek snaps, still stinging a little from Stiles reaction, “but the job is _at_ the gym, so it looks like I’ll still have nothing going on.”

“What -” Stiles says, pausing with his fork raised halfway to his mouth.

“They’re down a trainer, and Stan - the owner - said he’d been keeping an eye on me. I’m not certified yet, but Stan knows a guy who can get me into the training classes next month, and they’re going to pay for half the cost, and it shouldn’t take me more than six months. I know it’s not some office job with fancy -” Derek stops talking because Stiles has gotten out of his seat and come around the table to straddle Derek’s legs in his chair. He takes Derek’s face in his hands.

“You have a job. At the gym.” Stiles is grinning at him.

“Yeah. I start on Sunday.”

“And you’re going to go to school to learn how to teach people to do squats and pick up heavy things and yell at them about being lazy?” 

“I know you hate gyms, but personal training is a real job and needs actual -” Derek starts, but Stiles is kissing him, pulling hard on the hair at the back of his neck.

“Fuck,” Stiles pants when he finally pulls back. “ _Fuck_ , that is so great! I am so happy for you!”

“You did not seem happy a second ago,” Derek reminds him, trying for dry but landing somewhere near breathless. 

“A second ago I thought you were dressed up to head into DC after dinner to blow some senator’s aide in a fancy hotel room.”

“Oh,” Derek blinks at him. Looking down at himself, that… definitely wasn’t an unreasonable jump. “Maybe I overdressed for this announcement?”

“No shit?” Stiles says, but he’s laughing.

“You… really didn’t want me to start escorting again, did you?”

“Did you?” Stiles hits back, and Derek lets out a long breath.

“No,” he says. “I just didn’t… know what else to do.”

“Obviously,” Stiles says, running his hands through Derek’s hair, “the answer was ‘pick up heavy things and put them back down again’, at which you _excel_.”

“I do excel at that,” Derek says. He and Stiles sometimes speak entirely in sarcasm, and other people would probably assume Stiles’s comment was more of the same, but Derek knows better. He hooks his hands under Stiles’s thighs and stands up out of his chair, still holding on. 

“Fuck,” Stiles breathes out, and Derek watches his eyes go wide as Stiles wraps his long legs around Derek’s hips. Derek leans in to bite at Stiles’s neck, and Stiles whines. “We should - you made dinner -”

“It’ll reheat,” Derek growls and carries Stiles into the bedroom, dumping him on the bed. 

Stiles kicks his shoes off onto the floor while deftly undoing all the buttons of his dress shirt. Derek goes right for his belt. “Okay, wow, we should get you a new job every day,” Stiles laughs as Derek yanks it open. 

“That sounds a lot of work,” Derek notes, focusing his attention on getting Stiles’s pants open and off, off, _off_. He hadn’t been thinking about it since he got home, nothing more than a tiny voice in the back of his head reminding him that he doesn’t have to share himself anymore, with anyone. That his sex life will be contained to this apartment, this bed, this boy grinning up at him. The flood of relief that hits him in this moment isn’t all that surprising, though he’d never tell Laura. But the flood of giddy _want_ almost knocks him off his feet. He wants Stiles. He’s always wanted Stiles. But now he gets to have Stiles, all the time, maybe forever, if he plays his cards right. “Stiles,” he groans, almost dizzy with it. He has to do something, right now, and since Derek is still fully dressed, the only logical option is to crawl up the bed and swallow Stiles’s dick. 

“Motherfuck,” Stiles nearly shouts, arching off the bed and further down Derek’s throat. His right hand comes down on the back of Derek’s neck, fingers twitching helplessly. “I can’t - condom,” Stiles manages through a few heaving breaths, and Derek shakes his head without pulling off. It’s been months, now, of just the two of them and Derek feels safer in this bed than he’s ever felt anywhere. “Derek,” Stiles groans and when Derek flings out a hand, Stiles is waiting for it with his own, tangling their fingers together as Derek’s cheeks hollow. Derek breathes in the scent of Stiles, savors the feeling of skin on his tongue. He rasps the flat plane of it over the divot behind his crown, and Stiles gasps, his hand so tight in Derek’s that it almost hurts. “Not going to last if you keep doing that,” he grits out, like Derek wants to make this last, like Derek hasn’t been dreaming about Stiles coming down his throat for six fucking months. 

When he does come moments later, Derek swallows and swallows, tears pricking the corners of his eyes as he tries not to breathe. “Fuck, stop, fuck,” Stiles finally sobs out, pulling on Derek’s hair again. Derek pulls off his dick with a harsh sound and a short cough. Stiles barely gives him a moment to catch his breath before he’s folding himself into Derek’s space, pressing his mouth to Derek’s, sucking on his lower lip. “That was, oh my _god_ ,” he manages between kisses. 

“Yeah,” Derek manages, and fuck, his voice sounds _wrecked_. He _feels_ wrecked, sweaty and slick under his clothes. “Help me,” he manages, yanking on his own sleeve, and Stiles sits up enough to tug them open at the wrists as Derek yanks off his tie. 

“Arms up,” Stiles says softly, tugging the shirt over Derek’s head without bothering to deal with the buttons. His hands fall to Derek’s fly, and when he looks up, his eyes are almost black. “My turn,” Stiles says, and Derek shivers. 

“You don’t have to -”

“Fuck you, Hale,” he laughs, and Derek wants to laugh too but he can’t, not when Stiles is pushing him onto the mattress and settling between his thighs. “Goddamn,” Stiles says, almost reverently, his hands drifting in circles over Derek’s torso, fingers dancing over his tattoo and down to his hips. He lifts them as Stiles tugs his pants down just enough that Derek’s cock springs free. Derek hisses; he’s already so hard, it’s a little painful. Stiles leans in and, as fast and deep and hard as Derek had been, he goes in the other direction. He nuzzles at the base of Derek’s dick. He flicks his tongue against Derek’s balls. He catches Derek’s eyes as he rubs his lower lip against the crown, spreading precum over his mouth and then licking it off.

“Stiles,” Derek keens.

“You taste amazing,” Stiles tells him, smiling wide, and Derek’s hips press up without permission until his dick pushes into the wet heat of Stiles mouth. Stiles groans, a happy sound from the center of his chest, and Derek can feel it vibrating through him. 

“Oh,” he gasps, “That feels, fuck, so good.” He’s floating, and Stiles is a lifeline. Derek feels the weight of Stiles on him like an anchor, and he’s giddy when he realizes that for once he doesn’t feel like he’s going to crash into the shore. He’s got Stiles, Stiles has him, he hasn’t fucked this up, he’s not even sure how he could. 

He doesn’t even last a minute, not with Stiles's mouth on his skin. Stiles swallows just once before pulling off, and Derek almost apologizes, worried he misunderstood, but Stiles is holding fast to Derek’s dick, leaning in so that Derek’s coming in hot spurts over his mouth, his red cheeks, his freckled throat. 

“ _Jesus_ , Stiles,” Derek manages, his thighs still shaking. Stiles just looks up at him, grinning and filthy. 

“You like that?” he asks, like there is any way Derek wouldn’t like the picture Stiles makes right now, covered in his come, grinning widely. 

Derek just flops back on the mattress, laughing helplessly. “Yeah, I like that, Stiles.”

Stiles crawls up just enough to flop on Derek’s chest, rubbing his sticky face on Derek’s shoulder. “Congratulations,” he says a minute later. “On the job. It’s awesome.”

“Thanks.” Derek kisses his temple and Stiles hums. 

“I suppose we should try to eat dinner now? Smelled amazing.”

“Got the recipe from my first PT client,” Derek tells him. “She likes me.”

“The cookies lady?” Stiles asks, propping his head on his hand.

“The fudge lady today,” Derek tells him, and Stiles whoops with glee.

“Your new job already has more perks than mine.”

“I’ll try not to lord it over you.”

“As long as you share the goods,” Stiles tells him and Derek can’t imagine being happier anywhere in the world than he is right now, right here.

“What’s mine is yours,” Derek tells him. “Always.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It took me nearly 4 years to write a fic that happens over 8 months, but YAY I DID IT!
> 
> A million thanks to Allecto who never let me give up on this story, and who beta'd this final chapter like the wind from a million time zones away. 
> 
> And a million thanks to anyone reading this story - I honestly never gave up on it, but the last two years have been hard, writing-wise, and I was worried I'd never get to the end. Finishing this has been a wonderful joy for me, and I'm so glad I'm not leaving you all hanging anymore! Here's to a more productive 2017!


End file.
